


Towards Bright Skies

by hktk



Category: Kamen Rider OOO
Genre: Alternate Universe, Bittersweet Ending, M/M, Possession
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-22
Updated: 2015-05-22
Packaged: 2018-03-31 19:01:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 12
Words: 59,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3989182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hktk/pseuds/hktk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I always felt bad you were not human, Ankh, but I tried to put it past me. That is why I," still with the fake tone, and this time, another Eiji mannerism: He held his hands behind his head, kicking one foot out so it only rested on the heel, with his tongue sticking out slightly before he continued talking, "wanted you to be human so bad. But, in the end, the King helped me realize, you could not be that. So!" A quiet, Eiji laugh. "I betrayed you, Ankh!" </p><p>/’You could not be that, so I betrayed you.’/ The further he spoke, the worse Ankh’s chest ached. So it /was/ because of his body, his unimaginably bad luck to be made a creature such as this, that of course no human could be expected to love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Remember how sad the original OOO ending was? This is worse. 
> 
> This is a roleplay between a friend (sailormomotaros) and I (Virus). Nothing is edited, just left is (you can see where I started falling asleep in some places...), taken place over the course of roughly a month. I played Eiji primarily, while they played Ankh primarily. I'm on left, they're on right, just for clarity sake. 
> 
> Note that this started out before I finished OOO (so that line in like the third reply of mine is purely coincidental ww). Basically the gist was, "Ankh can also possess Eiji," plus some other stuff.

This Yummy was _tough_.

 

Eiji gasped for breath. Latorartar was draining on him, but the Yummy would not _go down_. Eiji was sure that if he were to be told time travel existed, he would certainly go back and tell himself to become better prepared for this Yummy. Not only had he been at low stamina when the fight begin—all thanks to that run-in with Kazari only a day prior—but the Yummy was one of Kazari’s—which meant it it was influenced by a combination of all the medals he had absorbed.

 

OOO paused to take a breather, running the O Scanner across the driver to initiate the—actually, he lost track of what number Scanning Charge this would be. Barely able to stand, Eiji shot a look up at Ankh, perched safely above like the bird he truly was; from the height he was at, Ankh’s expression was unreadable.

 

He turned his gaze away, took one step, then another, before giving a yell, giving it his all, as he charged towards the Yummy, hoping that this would be the final one, the final blow.

 

His hopes dashed away as quickly as he thought them. At first, he didn’t realize it—all he noticed was that he had stopped suddenly. Then, of course, pain flared in his abdomen. The transformation canceled, and without the visor, it was easy to see the tentacle that had pushed its way through his flesh.

 

Eiji wasn’t sure if it had poked out the other side or not. All he could focus on was the unbearable, insufferable pain running up his spine, down his legs, cracking through his skull. The Yummy pulled its tentacle out forcibly, blood following after it as if it were magnetized. With that, Eiji fell to his knees, and he finally noticed he was screaming.

 

“...nkh... Ankh! Ankh!” he found himself saying, as he wrapped his arms weakly around himself. The final muttering of the name lost all its sound as he fell forward, ground rushing up to meet him. The force of the impact hurt him even more, and although he wasn’t yelling anymore, the name still crossed his lips in a low, barely audible whisper. Tears brimmed in his eyes, body tense all over.

 

The fact that Eiji was clearly struggling with this fight wasn’t of any great interest to Ankh. He’d win eventually, and then they’d have more medals. It always went that way. And if he didn’t win, well, then Ankh didn’t have any use for him. Turning his gaze from the conflict below him, the Greeed inspected his talons, his thoughts going to more important things. Future plans, getting more popsicles later, how many cell medals this Yummy would yield…   
  
But his thoughts were abruptly pulled from this train of thought by a noise. A scream. Looking down from his perch, he was met with a sight that made him tense immediately, and a flurry of jumbled responses cluttered his mind. An OOOs that couldn’t beat a lowly Yummy was useless, someone who deserved to die. This was only logical. And clearly, he wasn’t winning.  
  
He was calling Ankh’s name.   
  
As though of its own will, his body was moving, jumping down and hardly pausing after hitting the ground before running over to the fallen man. The Yummy, distracted now by its mission - to fulfill its host’s desire - was no obstacle, and Ankh dropped to his knees at Eiji’s side. “Stupid,” was all he managed to get out, to his own surprise. The tips of his fingers felt numb as he reached out and pushed the man over onto his back, moving aside the ripped fabric of Eiji’s shirt to inspect the wound. It was bad.  
  
Drawing in a deep breath, Ankh tried to gather himself, but he felt his blood run cold seeing the damage. Where was this… panic coming from? Some idiot who couldn’t even best a Yummy was useless to him. It would be best to leave him, take the belt and find a better tool. But Ankh didn’t move. He couldn’t move. “Hey,” he started gruffly, grabbing the other man’s shoulder and shaking it roughly. “You better not be dying on me. ...Get up!” It was hard to keep a strained note out of his voice… Fear? Pleading? An emotion he himself couldn’t name.

 

Eiji blinked his eyes open, despite how difficult it currently was to do so. Sweat covered his face, back, arms, everywhere, sliding down his skin and into the slowly accumulating pool of blood. Ankh’s form swam in and out of his line of sight, blurry—but, he could tell, this was Ankh, definitely.

 

The touch of concern in the Greeed’s voice comforted Eiji. He could die now, if he wanted to, nicely, with only some regrets, but at least the peaceful smile currently on his face would forever be immortalized.

 

He reached up with one blood-covered hand, grabbing Ankh’s sleeve. How weak he was compared to just a few moments ago astounded him. The grip on the fabric could barely materialize, and it seemed as if he were just grasping for it, unable to actually hook his fingers into the wrinkles.

 

“Ankh...” he murmured. Eiji coughed once, twice, three times, more blood spitting up with each motion. He couldn’t understand what Ankh was saying, couldn’t hear him, his voice sounding garbled and distant, even though he knew Ankh was there. He desperately tried to sit up, and through sheer willpower, managed to, even though he immediately fell against Ankh.

 

If he had had the strength, he would’ve wrapped an arm around him.

 

“Thank you, Ankh.”

 

His vision screeched to a halt, everything going black quite suddenly, and his body—although still breathing, still alive and warm—went limp against the other.

 

He didn’t get a verbal response, but the fact that Eiji was moving was a pretty clear sign that the human hadn’t expired on him yet. Human senses really were strong, he noted with the dizzying smell of blood and the sharp clarity he viewed the scene with. All the blood seemed like it was too red, too bright. But he didn’t even notice that it stained him too when he grabbed the man as he fell.

 

Awkwardly shifting his grip on Eiji, holding him against him, Ankh stared down at the man. “What the hell are you talking about?” Thanking him? For what? But before he could question further, Eiji was unconscious. “Hey. ...Eiji. Eiji!” The panic he’d held back was coursing through his body, only heightening the painful awareness of everything around him. The blood, the unconscious man against him, the too-bright sun beating down on them-

 

He was breathing. Through the confusion, Ankh clearly and with relief realized that he was breathing. He exhaled shakily. “Idiot,” he repeated, although there was no way Eiji could hear it. He had to move, now, Ankh thought blearily. Why? To get Eiji help, right. He needed to find someone to tend to these wounds.

 

He gathered the limp man into his arms, before pushing himself to his feet with slight difficulty. He tried to push aside the flurry of baffling emotions, instead focusing on the task of taking him back to Cous Coussier, then getting ahold of someone to fix Eiji up. Ankh looked down at Eiji, a glare coloring his face now. “You’d better not die, or I’ll kill you,” he mumbled.

 

When his eyes opened, he was aware of two things.

 

The first was simple: Inside. As his gaze focused on the ceiling above him and flicked to his surroundings, relief washed over his face. The familiar surroundings of the backroom of Cous Coussier came into his view, and he was glad that he had made it back home.

 

The second was not so simple: Confused. Even though he knew where he was, he wasn’t aware of how he came here, or what happened in the fight. In fact, he had a hard time recalling the fight—anything after he had transformed initially was lost on him in one big, blurry mess. The only thing that stuck out in complete clarity was Ankh.

 

Eiji blinked, turning his head back to the ceiling. A wave of nausea overcame him, though it wasn’t strong enough to really make him do anything. He held one hand up above his face, noting the bandages—then, with wide eyes, as if seeing one wound triggered the other, pain coursed through his body. He choked on nothing in particular, heart pounding rapidly in his ear as he turned on his side.

 

His hands went to the bandages around his abdomen, and when he withdrew one of them, it was red stained, signaling that blood had already begun to seep through the stark white. Eiji lowered his hand again, strength lost as he huddled in his bed, practically pushing himself against the wall, making muffled sounds of pain every now and then.

 

Hina had told him that he had to wait to see Eiji. Well, he’d waited long enough, hadn’t he? ...Probably not as long as she meant, but Ankh wasn’t a patient Greeed. The only thing that had truly kept him from barging in already was his own hesitation. His reaction then… It scared him, in retrospect. What had come over him? He reasoned that of course, it’d be bad to lose someone who was useful most of the time. And to be down to only having one person to possess… That would be troublesome too.

 

But a nagging thought kept him wondering. It wasn’t just that. Ankh couldn’t say he recalled feeling things like that before. Concern, fear… Was it only for so cold a reason as usefulness? What else could it be? Well, he had a guess, but it wasn’t something he wanted to admit out loud. It really was probably just because of the question of usefulness. Hina had said that he couldn’t possess Eiji for a while, because of this...

 

Standing outside the door to the back room they shared, Ankh paused a moment, hand on the doorknob. There was no reason for him to bother with this. He could say he was just coming in to get… a new shirt, or something. He could just walk away and leave it be, push all of his confusion down and bury it down where it would never bother him again.

 

Instead, he opened the door. Hearing the noises of pain, he strode in perhaps a little quicker than he’d intended, shutting the door behind him loudly. As he looked at the man on the bed, he found himself standing there awkwardly. He looked like he was in pain, but Ankh only took a step towards his perch, levelling his gaze anywhere but at Eiji. “Oi.” A long pause. What to say next? “Are… you okay?” He asked. Well, clearly he wasn’t okay, Ankh cursed to himself immediately after the words left his mouth.

 

Eiji heard the voice, the concerned tone, but didn’t understand what was being said. The heavy pain really messed with any other processes. He squirmed on the bed, throwing the blankets off, and only when he pressed his face against the cool wall did he have enough composure to think.

 

“Ankh...?” he muttered. He was too scared to move, too afraid that if he changed positions even slightly that the pain, abated for now, would rear its ugly head again but worse. He clutched at one of his sleeves, and a smile fell upon his lips.

 

Even though Ankh was probably only coming in to take something out of the room they shared, it warmed Eiji’s heart to know that Ankh was even within his presence. That, at least, meant that Ankh had escaped the fight okay.

 

He put a hand on the bed, then the other, and he pushed, very slowly, grunting and stopping every now and then to catch his breath. By the time he had sat up all the way, his breath was ragged, and his hair clung to his sweat stained forehead, framing his face. He watched Ankh, for his reaction, but eventually he simply smiled and nodded.

 

“I’m fine,” he said, voice breaking from lack of use. “I’m... glad you are... too, y’know.”

 

He glanced back at Eiji despite himself, fixing a hard look onto his face. But the man’s next words left the Greeed with a look of surprise that quickly contorted into anger. “I’m not the one who nearly got killed,” he snapped. “Really, do you ever think of yourself?” His words held a slightly ridiculing tone now, masking the surprise he felt at those words. He was glad that Ankh was alright. How stupid. ...It made him feel peculiarly warm inside to hear his concern.

 

Remembering his pretense, he strode over to his perch and picked up the small medal case sitting on the red fabric. Ankh paused there for a moment. He could leave now, his pretended task fulfilled. But… He shot another glance at the man. He shouldn’t have been pushing himself like that, Ankh thought absently. It was only sitting up, but still. He turned to walk back to the door, but paused uncertainly in front of Eiji’s bed.

 

It would really be best for him to just leave now. Sure, the man wasn’t doing well, but he’d live. There was no good reason for Ankh to stay, but he didn’t move despite this, instead looking Eiji over with an unreadable expression.

 

He looked away again, crossing his arms. “You should rest. The longer you’re hurt, the longer we’ll be unable to collect medals. And the longer I’ll be stuck using this body, apparently.” Hina’s warning didn’t deter him from considering trying to possess Eiji, though. He liked his body better than this man’s, just as a matter of personal preference.

 

Eiji had been right. Ankh was only in here to get something and leave. Although it was entirely expected, it still had Eiji hurting a little. Unlike Ankh, Eiji was very aware of his feelings towards Ankh—or, at the very least, he knew that there was some sort of positive feeling there, with the lines blurred.

 

Despite how much pain he was in, emotionally and physically, Eiji just smiled, though he didn’t heed Ankh’s words. He waved a hand, laughing a little (it sounded pained, forced), and replied, “Yeah, of course. I’ll be walking by tomorrow, alright? Trust me.”

 

Even though he was certain that wasn’t going to happen, saying it aloud made it sound almost believable. Eiji grunted as he peeled one hand that had come to rest over the injury. It was still coated in red, though it seemed like the blood on his hand had dried. Without looking up from his hand, he spoke once more.

 

“What about the Yummy? Did it get away?”

 

He still couldn’t remember, and that drove him nuts. He wanted to remember, but the memories just didn’t come at all. So, he had to rely on Ankh, who was most decidedly an unreliable narrator most of the time, to fill him in. Maybe rest would do him good and jog his memory.

 

Eiji looked up at him now, face contorted in mild pain—seemed more like a grimace, a scowl, similar to a face Ankh always wore—and let his arm keeping him up give out. He fell back onto the pillow with a wince, and finding that laying flat on his back aggravated the wound even more, he turned back on his side. This time, however, he faced the opposite of the wall.

 

“Um,” he started quietly, “before you go... can you... please get me a new shirt?”

 

Ankh, meanwhile, dearly hoped that Eiji wouldn’t bring up what had happened earlier. Did he remember? If he recalled Ankh’s strange reaction… This concern kept him silent for a moment before he replied. “Yeah. It’s fine, it’ll build up more medals this way.” He started to leave again, but both his own hesitation and Eiji’s request stopped him.

 

He nodded silently, moving to the dresser where Eiji kept his clothes to yank open a drawer and pull out the first garishly colored shirt he laid eyes on. He considered just throwing the clothing and making a run for it, but instead took it over to the man. Once again coming to a stop in front of Eiji, he dropped the shirt next to him.

 

He’d long since cleaned the bloodstains from his own clothing, but… He could easily recall Eiji’s blood on his hands, the nauseating smell that covered him completely by the time he’d gotten Eiji to safety... The memory made him feel sick in a sense deeper than mere visceral disgust.

 

He looked at the man with irritation, giving a huff. “You can hardly sit up,” he pointed out disdainfully. “Are you sure you’ll be able to manage something as complex as changing clothes?” He considered offering to help, and the thought took him by surprise. Eiji was… a tool. A useful one, albeit frustrating. Ankh stayed by him to accomplish his own goals.

 

And yet… If that was all he was, why did Ankh feel like this? Concern, not like one would worrying about a broken tool would feel, but like something very, very important had been damaged. Someone very, very important. His kneejerk reaction to the thought was disgust, a visible grimace twisting his mouth downward.

 

Of course. It'll gather more medals. That wasn't what Eiji was afraid of, though. Yummies were volatile and sometimes unpredictable, and he could hardly remember what the desire it spawned from was. A frown crossed his face. People would get hurt, most likely, and he couldn't do anything about it until he was better.

 

He HAD to get better. It wasn't a want. It was a need. To protect people was the divine reason why he had been assigned OOO, probably, although he really didn't believe in that kind of stuff. But regardless of whether someone did change his fate to give him this opportunity or not, people still needed protecting, and he wasn't about to sit around being useless again.

 

Eiji wiped his hands on his current shirt, trying to remove any excess. He leaned on his elbow, partially sitting up, wincing. A grimace overtook his expression, and although he had opened his mouth to answer Ankh, the thought dashed away as he hung his head forward, clenching his teeth hard, swallowing the newest group of bile so far.

 

After a few moments, a shaky breath let out, and he gasped for another as he sat up all the way. He could feel the wound reopening, which was awful, and he probably shouldn't put on another shirt. That thought didn't occur to him, however. Unable to actually talk with this amount of pain, he slowly raised his hands and tugged his current shirt off.

 

Once it was off, he was scared to look down at the sopping wet and red bandages.

 

At least, luckily for him, he didn't have the strength to put on the new shirt. Even though it felt pathetic to look so vulnerable in front of Ankh, he knew the other wouldn't leave him. He was a tool to Ankh, nothing more. Eiji looked up at Ankh with pleading eyes, breath ragged and heavy, hands by his side.

 

It really should have been a pathetic sight, and it was, a bit. But Ankh didn't consider leaving again. He drew his mouth into a hard line, gaze steely as he sat down on the bed, picking up the shirt between his talons. He couldn't look... soft in front of Eiji. Any overly concerned actions would probably prompt some stupid response from him, a teasing observation about whether Greeeds felt sympathy or the like.

 

So he glared at his hand as he held up the shirt, pointedly avoiding Eiji's gaze. Ankh wasn't sure why he couldn't look him in the eye. Seeing him like this... Well, it wasn't as though Eiji hadn't been injured before, but this was the first time it had felt so urgent. So worrying.

 

But what was he worried for? Ankh was far from dense, but he was having trouble parsing out his own feelings. The creeping idea that he had at least an inkling of care for Eiji's wellbeing... for Eiji... Well, that would just be stupid. Completely implausible.

 

After all, such feelings were useless. Not only useless, but dangerous. Things like that created dependence, intimacy. They made people become vulnerable.

 

Ankh glared harder at his hand. "Well? Do you want help or not?" He demanded.

 

Eiji wasn't stupid.

 

He could see Ankh avoiding him, avoiding looking at him. He wasn't sure if the Greeed was doing so because he hated the way humans look like this, hated the smell of blood, hated how pathetic and vulnerable humans were--or, perhaps, if Ankh refused to look at him because he didn't want to help Eiji, didn't want to spare him the time of day until he was fit and fighting for medals again.

 

Okay, maybe Eiji was a little stupid. He wasn't a mind reader.

 

He couldn't help but laugh a little, though this time, it wasn't as forced, at how angry Ankh seemed. It was almost endearing, how much he hated helping Eiji. The light heartedness didn't last very long, however, as Eiji lifted up his arms, and the pain that had momentarily been forgotten came rushing back to him.

 

He lost his balance, in a way. The sudden movement caused blood to rush to his head, dizzying him to the point where, instead of sitting straight up, he leaned forward suddenly, both hands lowering, shooting out to grip onto Ankh's wrist.

 

The familiar grip of Ankh's Greeed form, or what was left of it, comforted him. It meant that at least Ankh was /here/. His body felt heavy, but so to not make Ankh uncomfortable, he forced himself to stay mostly up, although he slumped, his face awfully close to Ankh's.

 

With a sheepish smile, he stuttered out, "S-Sorry." It was his turn to avoid the other's gaze.

 

He started at the sudden contact, almost pulling away instinctively. It... wasn't necessarily /bad/, he thought, the feeling of Eiji's hands gripping his wrist. Then, he wondered at himself for thinking such a thing. What a stupid thought. He was unable to keep surprise from flashing across his face, though, clearly taken off-guard. It was one thing for him to disregard personal space, something that he never really thought twice about, but this abrupt proximity was an entirely different story. Ankh quickly scowled, drawing away so that their heads weren’t so close together.

 

“Careful,” he snapped distractedly. His gaze flickered down to the bandages, stained deep red. If Eiji had survived that only to die from something so stupid as bleeding out, Ankh didn’t know what he’d do with himself. Hunt down Eiji in the afterlife and kill him all over again, probably. He hadn’t pushed away Eiji yet, completely aware of the warmth radiating from his hand onto the scales and plates of his monstrous arm. It was a little bit distracting.

 

The bizarre mood he was finding himself in was unsettling, and the more time he spent around Eiji, the worse it got. Ankh felt anger further burn in the pit of his stomach, at both himself and the situation. Why did this have to happen? Why was it bothering him so much? At this point, he was doggedly clinging to the justification that all this concern was directly related to the disadvantage it brought him.

 

It was the only reasonable explanation.

 

Realizing he’d been sitting there stupidly, Ankh drew his arm away from Eiji’s grip, eyes narrowing. With his human hand, he grabbed the man’s shoulder to steady him. “If you keep straining yourself, you really will die, and where would that leave me?” In the market for a new OOOs and short one host. And probably in search of a new nest, at that. He grabbed the shirt from where he’d dropped it and started moving to try and rather roughly fit it over Eiji’s head.

 

“I’m /not/ going to the trouble of tracking down another resilient idiot and starting all over again.”

 

Eiji was too miserable to smile, to laugh at that, to joke off the feeling of only being used for someone else's gain. He hurt too much, both inside and out, to force on this persona he had accidentally created, birthed from being around Ankh, being told he's a tool by his parents and Ankh.

 

So he sat there, limply, allowing Ankh to pull the shirt over him. In no mood to fight, he let go of Ankh's arm, and despite how rough Ankh pulled and tugged, the shirt slipped on rather easily. "I know," he said, keeping his eyes down, face flushed from both exhaustion and what had happened moments prior. "You need me. To fight, for the medals," he added quickly.

 

He used one hand to pull the shirt over his head all the way, grunting as he did so. Once it was snugly on, he finally looked up at Ankh, eyes glistening with fresh tears. He wasn't sure if it was because of the pain or not.

 

"Thank you," he whispered, followed by a cough, and a smile. Regardless of whether or not Ankh would object, Eiji grabbed onto his wrist—the Greeed—and used Ankh as an anchor to lower himself back into the bed. He said nothing, only shut his eyes, knowing he had to lay flat or else the wound would just open again. He pulled the covers back over himself, taking deep, shaky breaths.

 

"You can leave now, if you want," he said eventually, eyes still shut. "Don't get into any trouble without me."

 

Ankh slowed, looking distracted. ‘You need me. To fight, for the medals.’ Eiji’s words rang oddly to him. Yes, he needed Eiji to get medals, but… It didn’t feel entirely true, at the same time. He elected to ignore meeting the man’s gaze, until he looked up from his inspection of a blanket on the bed only to be faced with a tearful Eiji. A feeling of dread immediately followed the pang of… concern that struck him.

 

Oh no.

 

He didn’t even make any complaint when his arm was grabbed once again, too wrapped up in his own panic.

 

When Eiji had shut his eyes, Ankh glanced back at him, the hardened expression melting away. His look as he stared at the other man was almost gentle, albeit darkened by confusion. He reached out with his right hand without really thinking, fingers nearly brushing the other’s cheek before he paused, alarmed.

 

He stayed frozen, baffled by his own movements before he drew back suddenly. A brief stream of curses ran through his mind as he scrambled further back, until he was just sitting on the edge of the bed. He was pretty sure Eiji was still /awake/, how would it look if Ankh did something like… like that? Why was he even compelled to do something like /that/? Finally breaking the silence left in the wake of Eiji’s words, he cleared his throat. “I wasn’t planning to. ...Get into any trouble, that is.”

 

He went to push himself up from the bed, before pausing a moment. “Don’t do anything stupid. I’ll make sure the Yummy gets taken care of. So... just rest,” he mumbled the last part, as though he wasn’t sure whether or not he wanted Eiji to hear it.

 

Eiji didn't feel it. The hand, that is, that almost touched him. He did feel Ankh's presence growing closer, but anything that dealt with specifics was lost on him. Then, the scrambling, and Eiji wondered briefly what Ankh had been doing, why he was still here, as he so desperately wanted to leave. Before he had any other time to think about that, Ankh had spoken.

 

"Good," he replied. Although Ankh mostly kept to himself, he did tend to wander out without telling anyone, leaving through the window and never looking back. It worried both Hina and Eiji when he left, though he wasn't gone for long. And, with his unfinished state, there was only so much he could do--if Ankh ran into Kazari or Uva, or even this Yummy, Eiji was sure he'd have a hard time not dying.

 

Which, unfortunately, is what Ankh went on to explain he was going to do. Eiji's eyes shot open, and his head tilted in Ankh's direction. "What?!" he shouted, then winced. He took a big breath before continuing: "How are you going to destroy the Yummy without me? Just... Just wait, alright?"

 

Concern was apparent in his eyes, and he was practically pleading Ankh not to do anything too reckless--what a hypocrite, honestly! He reached out and brushed his own fingers at Ankh's hand before the Greeed could get off the bed all the way.

 

"Wait for me, Ankh. Please."

 

He slipped his hand all the way into Ankh's, albeit loosely.

 

Ankh gave a long-suffering sigh, his glare returning at Eiji’s protests. Wasn’t he the one always worrying over Yummies rampaging? Ankh needed to blow off steam anyways, and what better distraction than focusing on that whole mess? “I’m not completely useless, you know. A weak Yummy like that couldn’t kill a Greeed if it tried,” he said this casually, with an air of superiority that ignored the fact that he wasn’t quite a Greeed in body at the moment. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll--”

 

He went rigid at Eiji’s touch, once again looking akin to a deer in headlights. When it had just been a brief touch, he’d steeled himself to push the hand away. But when Eiji’s hand had continued to slip into his, clasping his own hand, Ankh’s arm felt frozen.

 

The Greeed leveled his gaze evenly at a crack on the wall. The urge to just bolt out of the room was becoming greater and greater. After a moment of tense silence, he managed a few words. “Okay. /Fine/. I’ll wait. Just… Don’t…” He pulled his hand away as he spoke, sounding almost comically pained. “Don’t do that.” He just prayed that his reaction would be taken as anything other than embarrassment. The awful, traitorous human heart in his chest seemed to be beating a little strangely, too fast to be normal.

 

It wasn’t that it was unpleasant to him. The more unpleasant thing was that Ankh… had found it to be /nice/, however brief the contact was. ...Eiji had taken his arm before, Ankh himself had certainly grabbed him to drag him somewhere with it enough times. So why was he so skittish over this?

 

He wondered how frowned upon it would be to punch something right now. But he didn’t punch anything, or bolt either, just sitting on the edge of the bed, tensed. “I’m not taking responsibility for its rampage, though,” he quickly claimed, hoping that he could easily bully the conversation into a different topic. Any topic that didn’t involve hand-holding.

 

Eiji withdrew his hand, laying his arm across his chest. Although he was still nervous that Ankh would go and deal with the Yummy anyway, he forced himself to put on a smile. He didn't close his eyes again; instead, he watched Ankh once more, watching his movements and reactions, and he wished he would look at him back.

 

"Don't do what?" he asked, somewhat jokingly, though he really didn't know what Ankh didn't want him to do. He had an inkling of an idea, but he wanted Ankh to say it, to confirm it, if only to see him embarrassed--more so than he was already.

 

He sighed. "You won't be responsible." I'll shoulder that burden, as usual, so you can get off scot-free, he wanted to say, but didn't. "Date is out there, too. He should at least be able to... hold it off..." Anxiety crept along his spine as he worried for Date and Gotou. He really did need to get well soon, quick as possible. Pursing his lips, he scratched his chin.

 

"Anyway, you say that you could take it, but even I couldn't," he pointed out, shifting in the bed, relaxing a little bit more--as much as he could, at this point, though he seemed just as tense as Ankh seemed to be. "You'd just be hurting Shingo's body, if you went out there, and I know he nor Hina will appreciate that."

 

There was a pause, and he flicked his eyes away from Ankh, to the ceiling, for just a moment, until he spoke quietly, "Do you think Kazari has gotten stronger?"

 

Ankh, taking a deep breath, drew himself up. “Don’t touch me needlessly like that, it’s annoying,” he said tersely.

 

He didn’t bother arguing against Eiji’s observations, because, well, they were true. Sure, his pride was a little wounded, but it was a stupid thing to argue over. He was in a vastly weakened state, not much stronger than he had been when they’d first met. And although he wasn’t, well, just reduced to an arm now, a human body was much more fragile than a Greeed’s. So to err on the side of caution was, of course, part of his imagined plan. Not that he preserved the well-being of the detective for the sake of the man and his sister. As was his motivation for most things, Ankh paid heed to the limitations of this body for his own interests.

 

At the question, he was silent for a while. As it stood right now, they were quite vulnerable. One of the only things that stood between Ankh and sure defeat at the hands of his former comrades was the fact that he had OOOs, and with Eiji injured like this, that insurance was gone for the moment. He’d have to tread carefully, not only because of the Yummy.

 

There was also the creeping paranoia that not merely him, but Eiji could be targeted because of this. The other Greeed had never shown too much interest in OOOs when he didn’t interfere with their agendas, but someone like Kazari, who beared a particular grudge towards Ankh, might try to use the opportunity to strike.

 

He finally glanced back at Eiji, distracted as he thought about this. “Probably,” he responded flippantly. “We’ll just have to get stronger.” It was the only option. “But that won’t happen if you do something idiotic and bleed to death, so for now we’ll just have to wait.”

 

"Annoying?" It was just the answer that Eiji had expected, though it was still kind of satisfying to hear Ankh say it like that--his tone of voice, the way he tensed himself and made himself bigger, as if he really were a bird of prey. It was nice to drive Ankh crazy once in awhile, in retaliation for everything Ankh did to him.

 

Not that that thought had been on his mind when he grabbed his hand, though. That was entirely different.

 

Eiji remained silent for a moment, just listening to Ankh's words. The fact that Ankh didn't respond to his other words meant that Ankh silently agreed with him. He chuckled again, letting out a breath at the mention of him bleeding out.

 

"I won't," he promised. "I would never leave you behind like that, Ankh. There's still so much to do." He nodded, with resolution and determination, eyes on fire, as he met Ankh's gaze, taunting smile clear as day on his face. "I'll get stronger, and we can take him head on, deal with him once and for all."

 

There was a pause, implying he was thinking, though he really didn't think about what he said next. Didn't think too in detail.

 

"I'm sure I can do it with you by my side."

 

It was a few more moments of strained silence before he processed what he had said, what that entailed, how Ankh would take it. Eiji's face burned bright, and he diverted his eyes again, back to the ceiling, with a look of minor horror.

 

Eiji’s promise made him relax a little, secretly feeling pleased with the assurance. But it was hard not to feel doubt. It wasn’t a matter of not trusting that Eiji meant it, it was a matter of trusting whether or not he could keep such a promise. He could tell Ankh all day that he wouldn’t leave him like that, but in the end, humans were so much less durable than Greeed.

 

This whole thing just made tangible how easily Eiji could be ripped away from him.

 

It was unsettling to think about, because Ankh had never considered so clearly a world without him since they'd met. He'd thought vaguely about them parting, in a sort of distant way, of course. What-if scenarios and imagining the inevitable day that he regained his body and no longer had need of OOOs.

 

It took him a moment to process the words, and then another to further process Eiji's reaction. This... this damn /idiot/ just had to look at him with those /eyes/ and say something like /that/, something so trusting and sincere. Why the hell was he doing that? Was he doing it on purpose? Amusing himself by playing some great joke and making Ankh feel infuriating emotions like embarrassment and tenderness and... well, he couldn't really bring himself to even just vocalize the others internally.

 

He hardly noticed the look of alarm on his own face at first. Quickly ducking his head down, Ankh scowled half-heartedly. “You’re sounding even stupider than usual today,” he mumbled in response finally, finding it difficult to find anything more eloquent to say.

 

Glancing at Eiji, he noted embarrassment in the other’s face. “Your face is red,” he pointed out without really thinking. If he wasn’t feeling almost as embarrassed himself, he’d muster a laugh or something, but he trailed off awkwardly instead, glancing away again.

 

"Stupider?" echoed Eiji, eyes still glued to the ceiling. He did sound stupid, he thought. He sounded stupid even entertaining the idea. Maybe this was karma. This had to be karma, for torturing Ankh just for that short period of time. He silently resolved himself to never even /think/ about getting back at Ankh.

 

"I guess it must be the pain, or something," he tried, sounding unconvincing even to himself. Eiji really never had been a good actor, but at least the pain was a plausible excuse. Near fatal wounds that still had the chance of bleeding out could do that to a man, he supposed, make them say some weird things.

 

He sat in silence until Ankh spoke, when he halted the staring contest with a particular spot in the ceiling and looked back at the other. At the mention of how red he was, he—well, he did what any other embarrassed man would do: More redness flushed his face, and he denied it.

 

"It's not, it's not!" he claimed, raising a hand to cover his undoubtedly rosy face. Eiji squirmed in the bed, peeking an eye out from between fingers, and with his free hand, pointed at Ankh. "Yours is too! You're all red too!" Even if Ankh wasn't all that red, even if it was barely noticeable, Eiji flipped the tables on him, trying to divert the subject from himself.

 

So much for not getting back at Ankh.

 

He turned over in the bed, facing away from Ankh. He still covered his face, even though Ankh wouldn't have been able to see it from his vantage point. He squirmed and settled diagonally in the bed, calves pressed up against Ankh's back. He didn't notice.

 

"Why're you still here?" he questioned quietly. "Normally you would've left by now." Not that he wanted him to go.

 

It was pretty amusing at first, to see Eiji scramble to deny it. Ankh nearly grinned, but the man's next claims stopped him. He bristled at the accusation. “I’m not!” He snapped quickly, recoiling (and nearly falling off the bed in this abrupt motion), but he could feel a faint warmth in his own cheeks. He once again cursed the treacherous human body and all its useless functions.

 

Attempting to banish the blush, he scowled fearsomely at the back of Eiji's head. As far as Ankh was concerned, all of these terrible feelings were /his/ fault. At Eiji's question, however, his glare faded.

 

“I don’t know,” he muttered, because it was true. “There’s nothing to do around here.” Which was also true. Still, he should have left long ago, not let himself entertain all these ridiculous ideas. Hesitating, he dropped his gaze to the worn blanket covering the bed. Reaching out a hand, he picked absently at a stray thread. After a long moment, he spoke again.

 

“Do you want me to leave?” Ankh didn’t move his focus from the thread, but he listened intently for Eiji’s response. His tone was uninterested, carefully detached, as though he were asking about the weather or something similarly unimportant.

 

Maybe Eiji would tell him to leave, and then he’d have an excuse to get out of here and forget that all this ever happened. Or maybe he’d ask him to stay. Ankh wasn’t sure which one he wanted to hear.

 

Eiji didn't move from his new position. He did shift, though--a little uncomfortable looking, uncomfortable feeling, even though it really didn't have anything to do with how he was actually sitting. He removed his hands from his face, shifting the one on top to his side, where it rested over his stomach, fingertips brushing the shirt just above the bandages.

 

He didn't want to think about that, however.

 

He focused on Ankh's words, on his tone. Ankh had clearly come in to get the medal case and leave, though Eiji wouldn't know exactly for what reason Ankh would need the medals. Eiji couldn't transform, and none of Ankh's medals were in there. Was he just gonna sit around and stare at them? Admiring them?

 

Even Ankh got bored, though, it seemed. Who wouldn't? When they weren't out fighting Yummies and the other Greeed, there /really/ wasn't much to do around there, as Ankh had pointed out. Eiji had tried repeatedly, on separate occasions, insistently, to talk to Ankh about anything, to get to know him more, to spend time with him, though had been brushed off more times than he could count.

 

Eiji was aware of Ankh's slight movements, though not what he was doing.

 

When the other spoke again, it spooked Eiji. He had fallen into the comfortable silence, and it really didn't cross his mind that Ankh could still talk. He jumped a little, hardly noticeable, though he was sure Ankh would notice, and his face flushed once more.

 

The redness in his cheeks grew even brighter when he realized the answer to Ankh's question. "I..." he started, taking a minute or two. He cleared his throat, even though he didn't need to, and rolled back onto his back. His hand rested just a few centimeters from Ankh's own, busy one.

 

"...No," he finally answered. This was his chance. "I'd like you to stay." He shut his eyes, preparing for the door slam that would inevitably follow.

 

Ankh didn’t look up for a while, examining the blanket under his hand intently. That didn’t mean he wasn’t paying attention to Eiji’s movements, though. His eyes flickered to the hand quite close to his, and he nearly drew back, not wanting any strange reaction again, or for Eiji to see said reaction. But he focused on anything but the hand instead, and didn’t move.

 

He wanted him to stay. And that filled Ankh with a strange warmth, a… sense of happiness. And more than a little surprise. He wouldn’t expect Eiji to answer that way. With a personality like his, Ankh was more used to people trying to avoid being around him. Another reason that entertaining all these stupid feelings was a useless idea. But… He /wanted/ Ankh here.

 

The Greeed paused in his slow destruction of the blanket, resting his hand flat on the bed instead. His talons nearly brushed Eiji’s fingers now, and he realized that he hadn’t met Eiji’s eyes yet. Glancing at the man finally, he couldn’t stop faint irritation from coloring his expression. “Why? You won’t get any rest if I keep talking to you.”

 

Nonetheless, he shifted from sitting on the very edge of the bed to a more comfortable spot further up. “...Fine,” he said, more quietly. It would probably be more like him to be contrary, leave out of spite just because Eiji wanted him to stay.

 

But Ankh wanted to be here too.

 

So, he sat there awkwardly instead, unable to think of anything to say. His gaze roamed to avoid Eiji’s again, his entire manner perhaps more than a little tenser than usual.

 

Even though Ankh agreed, even though the only shifting Ankh did was moving up further in the bed (he made sure to move his legs, so Ankh could sit properly), it still came as a surprise. Not an unpleasant surprise, however. His eyes reopened and he looked up at Ankh, just missing his chance to meet his gaze. He kept focused on Ankh, a small smile creeping upon his face.

 

"I'll be fine," he reassured. "I'm not doing anything but talking. So I can rest just fine even like this." He knew that it was contrary, this whole set up, to how he was actually supposed to be resting, how he was actually supposed to be healing, that he was supposed to be sleeping day and night as the wounds started to close. But he liked talking to Ankh.

 

And this was a rare chance where Ankh might, maybe, hopefully talk to him back.

 

Eiji's eyes followed Ankh's own, so that they both stared at the same spot, presumably. He shifted in the bed, just slightly, if only out of awkwardness, out of lack of things to say. He'd always desperately wanted a moment like this, but he had resigned himself to it never happening, so now... He was at a loss.

 

His eyes dropped back down to Ankh, smile dropping a tad. He pouted, almost. "Why are you so tense?" he asked, and the smile strengthened once more. "Are you really that scared of being around me for two minutes more than usual?"

 

But, he wouldn't press that issue, if Ankh didn't want to talk about it. Eiji had his own sensibilities and insecurities too, after all. He just wanted Ankh to feel comfortable.

 

After several more moments sitting in strained and awkward silence, Eiji finally couldn't take it any longer. He needed to talk, to find out more about Ankh, but he didn't have a clue on what to say. So, keeping his voice level, eyes on Ankh (focused on his shoulders), he spoke up.

 

"Can Greeed fall in love?"

 

At Eiji’s question, Ankh made a marked effort to look more relaxed. “No,” he muttered, seeming irritated at the suggestion. But, well… Maybe he truly was a little scared. Just not for the reasons Eiji was probably thinking. How else was he supposed to feel when confronted with unnerving emotions he’d never encountered before? And at that, he’d just agreed for some reason to stay in proximity to the very person that worsened the feelings.

 

This had been a terrible mistake, Ankh decided dismally. Maybe he could just leave right now, say he’d changed his mind… But Eiji was speaking again, another question. He glanced back at Eiji, looking a little surprised at the query. After masking this with a slight frown, he shrugged. Casting his gaze downwards again, Ankh thought for a moment. “Greeed don’t feel things like humans do,” he began, tone carefully dull. “Touch, taste, all those things… But emotions are more abstract.” Ankh spoke slowly, finding himself surprisingly transparent on the subject.

 

“Mezul acts like she feels love, but I don’t know if she actually does. I…” He searched for the best way to phrase his next words. Logically, Greeed didn’t fall in love. A pile of medals couldn’t love the way a human could, not when it wasn’t even alive to begin with. And yet, here he was. Ankh didn’t quite have the heart yet to call it love, but... there was undoubtedly something there. “It’s probably the kind of thing that a Greeed wouldn’t know until it happened.” And he spoke from experience. “So… I wouldn’t know, I suppose,” he added lamely. An easy lie, although spoken a little too hastily.

 

He cast a glance at Eiji again, gaze questioning. The question had been a little out of the blue. Eiji liked to ask questions, though. About the Greeed, about Ankh, all subjects Ankh usually declined to talk about. He hadn’t felt that it was necessary to tell him about things like that.

 

“I doubt things like that will help us any in fighting them, though,” he muttered.

 

He thought vaguely that only Eiji would ask such a useless question. He had already mostly brushed it off as just an idle query, not putting too much thought into why Eiji might ask something like that.

 

"Ah."

 

Eiji couldn't hide the small disappointment in his voice—actually, it was rather larger. His heart hurt, getting caught in his throat, and he choked a little. He waved a hand, passing it off as just swallowing some air wrong, just breathing wrong, as he was prone to do. Ankh had answered his question, finally, after countless times, and although Eiji didn't know what to expect, it certainly hadn't been that response.

 

He stayed silent for a minute, then spoke up, eyes flicking to the ceiling. "I didn't mean... I asked because..." He tripped over his words, not sure which phrase he should use that wouldn't give him away directly. Eiji was more open with his feelings than Ankh was, that was for sure, but—but love was still a first for him. This was the first time he had loved someone, past the platonic love he felt for Hina, Shingo, Gotou and everyone else. Parental love had died down quite awhile ago. So, everything was new for him—and it had to be a Greeed.

 

And he was scared.

 

"Love is a desire, isn't it?" he asked, very softly, very quietly, very vulnerable. He moved his hand away from where it had been sitting next to Ankh's placing it across his chest, over the heart, though that was unrelated to the current topic. "So... Greeed should feel love, right? It's possible, right?"

 

Eiji sounded desperate. He cleared his throat, calming his breathing, and winced. Pain flared up in his midsection again, and he suddenly moved, curling around himself. The breathing he had /just/ calmed down started up again, ragged and rough, and pain grimaced his face, clouding his mind, his senses, physical and mental.

 

He had curled towards Ankh, wall to his back, and although he /meant/ to clutch onto the blanket, he would soon find Ankh's pants bunched under his fingers tight. He kept his head down, thoughts still racing through his head, distorted by the pain.

 

"Ankh... I think..." he gasped, between words. "I think... Greeed c-can fall in love... I.... hope they can, anyway..."

 

Ankh rarely felt stirrings of desire from Eiji. It was strange, but he’d learned to get used to it. But now… /Love is a desire, isn’t it?/ He stared at Eiji, mind muddled by his own thoughts and the strains of desire that he could feel in his core medals, that could only be coming from the man beside him.

 

Oh no. It was one thing to feel things like this one-sidedly, to wrestle with all this confusion privately. But the prospect of those feelings being reciprocated was even more terrifying. He found himself at a loss for words, trying to come up with something that would… that would… deter Eiji? Let Eiji know how he felt? Let him avoid the subject?

 

“I… guess,” he conceded quietly. He almost said ‘I wouldn’t know’ again, but the words caught in his throat. It was a lie, because he knew from the ache in his chest--in even his core medals too--that Greeeds /did/ feel love. But how could he admit something like that to Eiji?

 

He moved slightly towards Eiji when the pain flared up again, instinctively reaching out, unsure of what to do to help. He hardly even reacted to the hand gripping his pants at first. Drawing in a shaky breath, Ankh looked down at it and very slowly moved his hand, letting it hover hesitantly for a long moment before he placed it over Eiji’s.

 

“Maybe,” he managed to begin, struggling to find the words or the voice to respond. “You might be right. Love… is certainly a desire.” Ankh’s voice was very quiet, and it took him a moment to be able to look at Eiji--or rather, what he could see of his face, with his head down.

 

He hesitated, completely at a loss for how to react to any of this. Love wasn’t something he could say he’d ever had any involvement with. He had cared for very, very people in the past, and hated a great many more. Another intake of breath, and he tightened his grip on Eiji’s hand.

 

“If… if I possessed you, you might not feel the wound as much.” Ankh didn’t quite know why he was saying it, his mind still overwhelmed, but there was no taking the words back now.

 

Momento mori, Eiji had thought when he had first got injured. In that moment, he felt like he was going to die. He expected it to happen. He was only counting down to the moments that his soul had left him—which is why he told Ankh what he did, in that heated moment. But somehow, fate had been kind to him, and he was alive.

 

But barely. With this amount of pain, he would rather be dead. Yet, Hino Eiji was never one to give up. His grip on Ankh's pants tightened as Ankh touched his hand. Warmth seemed to spread from the touch, all the way down Eiji's arm and into his chest, where it pooled. Ankh didn't push him away, didn't remove his hand. He cherished this small moment.

 

Eiji had wanted to respond to Ankh's reply to him. But, as luck would have it, not only could he not find the words, but he couldn't open his mouth to make any other noise besides low grunts, some groans, sparse and infrequent. He leaned forward, tucking his legs half under him, resting his forehead on Ankh's leg next to where their hands met.

 

He needed to be close, in these moments. He couldn't die here. He needed Ankh's presence to keep him going, to /really/ cement himself in place. Though he didn't want to give up on Hina, or Date or the others, didn't want to give up on the world, he felt like fate was choosing his end for him. So, he decided, he had to defy fate.

 

The hand not holding onto Ankh pressed against his wound. Even through the shirt he had just put on not too long ago, he could feel the wetness. It had been meaningless to change the shirt at all, then, if all he was going to do was bleed out through the fabric. But, he pressed, trying to lessen the pain, and the other hand switched positions, letting go of Ankh's pants, only to take a hold of Ankh's /hand/.

 

At the proposition, he shook his head. "No..." he managed. "You'd feel... it, t... too... I don't want you..." The hand on his stomach slipped, dug into something it shouldn't have, and he froze. Wetness, not blood, this time, fell onto Ankh's leg, and for the first time in a long while, Eiji thought selfishly.

 

"Ankh... Please..."

 

Ankh was a Greeed, he tried to rationalize, through the haziness. Even with a human body, Ankh could withstand pain, right? Plus, it was Ankh. He wasn't going to go down easily.

 

His tenseness melting away, Ankh allowed Eiji to take hold of his hand without any protest. Unsure of how to do something, anything about Eiji’s pain, he just held his hand more tightly in his own, as though he’d never get another chance like this again.

 

The man was refusing at first, rambling about worrying over /Ankh/. He glared a little, frustrated. “It isn’t as if it’d actually kill me, so it’s no big deal.” He could take pain, he had learned all too well how a human body felt it as opposed to a Greeed body, and adjusted to this.

 

His gaze softened then, as he became aware of something staining his pant leg. It wasn’t blood.

 

The plea, as far as he was concerned, was permission. “Okay,” he said. Slowly, reluctantly, he pulled his hand away from Eiji’s. He grasped his shoulders, gently guiding the man so that he no longer leaned on Ankh. “Hold on a minute.” Hopefully, the detective would stay unconscious long enough for this. Ankh’s possessions of him over long periods of time, combined with the… forcefulness of Ankh’s personality, often left Shingo a little bit incapacitated for a bit.

 

Ankh was hesitant to move away, but he stood, taking himself over to the ground by his perch. He sat, and the monstrous right arm detached itself, leaving Shingo leaned against a couple of boxes. Floating back over to the bed, Ankh hovered just over Eiji’s right arm. Truthfully, he was uncertain. He felt he could do it, easily, but… What if something went wrong?

 

But hesitation wouldn’t help anything. Putting all the worrisome thoughts from his mind, Ankh touched Eiji’s hand lightly. “Don’t move too much, it makes it harder for both of us.”

 

And with that, unless stopped by Eiji, the gauntlet-like arm would sink down to attach to his arm. His own mind wouldn’t overpower Eiji’s, but rather coincide with his, leaving both of them aware and conscious.

 

Eiji stayed hunched, unable to move. The hand, now sans Ankh, felt cold. At least now, as he had originally planned, he could clutch onto the bedspread, taking it in his hand, trying to find the warmth that was lost. He could feel his nails dig into the ball of his hand even through the cloth. How pitiful.

 

More tears fell, larger now, and he pressed his face into the blanket. He grit his teeth, trying not to quite literally scream in pain, clenched down hard enough to draw pain away from his stomach and focus on the minor pain in his mouth. His shirt, soaking up the blood that leaked over the bandages, stuck to his skin, and sweat beaded up on every inch of him that wasn't covered in blood.

 

Ankh's gentle touch soothed him a bit. He couldn't understand what he had said, not with this incessant ringing in his ears, but the touch was enough. Eiji took deep breaths, preparing for what was to inevitably come. Being possessed and possessing had grown commonplace between the two, and Ankh could take over so easily now that Eiji barely noticed until he heard the other thoughts in his mind.

 

As Ankh's own mind, his own thoughts and feelings, meshed with his own, as usual, it grew hard to tell which was which. There was no clear cut line between them now, as if they had been joined as one—which, in a way, was what had happened to them. Both retained their own thoughts and feelings, though the initial moments of possession were when one could hear the other the clearest and without restraint. He welcomed Ankh warmly, urgently, as he felt his own mind not necessarily pushed back but to the side.

 

« Ah, » he thought.

 

The pain did lessen on his end. He figuratively stepped back even more, and only a dull ache resided in his abdomen. This was much, much better. He could breathe now, take a break, relax for a moment or two.

 

All of these positive emotions dashed away as he realized—If he was feeling alright, then Ankh just not be. Eiji's worry grew, and he almost immediately regretted the situation, the decision to let Ankh take over for him, for being so selfish.

 

« Ankh, can you hear me? » He still recalled how awful his thoughts had been when put through this pain. Jus wondered if Ankh was paying attention to him anymore « Ankh, » he repeated. « Is it too much? »

 

The familiar feelings washed over him as he settled into this other body. Unlike possessing Shingo, he didn’t feel like a stranger sharing a body with Eiji. It had been awkward at first, of course, but by this point, he didn’t find it uncomfortable at all.

 

But this time he worried a bit, suddenly wondering if Eiji would hear-- There was little time for him to be concerned over Eiji hearing anything incriminating, because only moments after he’d adjusted to the possession, the pain began. It had just been a dull throb at first, but as Eiji moved back, it spiked quite suddenly.

 

He heard Eiji’s question, and started to respond. « It’s-- It’s fine, » he started. But at another further spike of pain in his--Eiji’s?-- Their abdomen, Ankh gasped, going to brace a hand over the wound. It was much worse than he’d thought. Was it the same for Eiji? Or was Ankh the one taking the brunt of the discomfort? He laid the body down gingerly, trying to push away the pain and focus on asking Eiji, « Is that any b-- » But he couldn’t finish his question, waves of pain erasing any thought besides an urgent need for it all to /stop/.

 

It was smarter not to move, not to aggravate the injury, but the pain muddled his thoughts too much, making him dig his nails into the blanket, the talons ripping an unlucky stretch next to him to shreds. Ankh twisted around, as though that would somehow allow him to escape the body wracked in pain, but the more he moved, the worse it felt. Unfortunately, that registered less in his mind than the need to /get out/.

 

He hardly felt Eiji anymore, too absorbed in the haze of sharp, stabbing pain that radiated from the wound. “E-Eiji,” he managed out loud, choking on any further words. He pulled his own hand--the Greeed hand--from where he’d placed it over Eiji’s stomach, and at the sight of his palm stained with Eiji’s blood, panic overtook him.

 

Twisting painfully and violently again, Ankh shuddered, feeling his hands--both his own and Eiji’s--tremble. The thought of simply just separating didn’t occur to him yet, his mind incoherent.

 

Although Ankh said it was fine, the actions that followed seemed to directly contradict what he had said. With the writhing, Eiji was already determined to get Ankh out, to not put Ankh through this--not because it was destroying Eiji's body, how Ankh moved, he must have surely opened the wound even further, but because he didn't want /Ankh/ to feel this way.

 

The minor relief he had felt just a few minutes ago was gone now, instead replaced with worry, with fright.

 

Especially when Ankh practically called out to him. Eiji couldn't read his mind, couldn't get into him at all, and Ankh was calling out to him, obviously in a desperate plea to end this all. Eiji panicked himself, and if he could pace, he would do so.

 

« Ankh! » he mind-yelled. « Ankh, calm down... I'm here... » Eiji began to press against the mind barriers, trying to get through to him, trying to burst through the closed space. If he could mesh one another together even further, he could perhaps soothe Ankh, at least long enough for Ankh to get out...

 

« Ankh, » he repeated, pressing harder. The dull ache that he felt increased in intensity as Ankh twisted and turned. « Ankh, it's Eiji. Ankh. Please. I change my mind. Get out, alright? I got it, I can take it... Just listen to me. »

 

At his wits' end, Eiji was at a loss as to what to do. If Ankh continued on like this, Eiji really /would/ die, and he didn't want to think about that. He didn't want to think about dying like this, dying with Ankh attached, as he presumed Ankh would even feel the death. He could only think of one thing to do, and it was--honestly--really risky.

 

He had to do something, though.

 

Eiji pressed against the barrier one more time. « Ankh, I... » He felt tired, all of a sudden, and he didn't know whether it was because of what he was about to say or because he had lost so much blood. « Ankh, I love you. Please. Just let go of me. »

 

Through the haze, Ankh could feel Eiji reaching out to him. He tried to focus on the voice, although he couldn’t make out the words at first. He could understand one word. His own name. Ankh held onto that, trying to keep still, although his mind urged him to thrash, to panic, to lash out. Taking deep, shaky breaths, he curled up, wrapping his arms around himself. The claws of his right hand dug into Eiji’s arm, nearly drawing blood, but it was little compared to the pain he felt already.

 

He had to… he had to get out. He had to get away from this. Although he was primarily panicked by his own discomfort, one of the still coherent parts of his mind understood that this was hurting Eiji. That if Ankh didn’t stop, this could kill him. Although his mind still reeled, Ankh tried to stop himself from moving any more. “Eiji,” he repeated, voice trembling, even weaker now. He could feel blood and sweat soaking the sheets underneath him, and he shut his eyes so that he wouldn’t have to see the bright stains blooming around him.

 

He had done this to try and alleviate Eiji’s suffering. A stupid, impulsive suggestion, looking back on it. Ankh cursed himself for even offering, when all he’d done was make everything worse. He struggled to keep his focus on Eiji now, putting his energy into fighting through the pain mentally. He heard Eiji say his name again, and then once more.

 

/Ankh, I love you./

 

Although he didn’t stop trembling, internally Ankh froze. He’d snapped, clearly. The pain had been too much, his mind had broken and now he was hearing things. He was conjuring up impossible, ludicrous scenarios to distract from the pain that coursed through his body. It was the only explanation that made sense.

 

But real or imagined, Ankh held onto that too. Words that cut clearly through the muddled blur of fear and pain, that allowed him to come back to himself. Expelling a final labored breath, Ankh released his hold on Eiji, his arm grasping at the sheets to pull himself away from the man as he detached. Reeling too much to think about returning to his other host right now, the arm instead lay on the bed, exhausted.

 

“Eiji… you…”

 

The metaphorical dam had been released. Eiji was back in front now, without Ankh there to buffer the pain, but it was better this way. He was glad that it had worked, even if it would cost him his life now, even if Ankh would hate him now, if Ankh avoided him for everything except fighting. He was glad that Ankh stayed in the bed with him, didn't leave immediately.

 

Eiji shot up to a sitting position, suddenly, the pain wracking his entire body now. Everywhere, down to his toes and every single bone, ached now, the pain having tripled in intensity before Ankh had taken over. His hands flung to his mouth, and he wasn't sure what he had thrown up--whatever he had eaten last or blood or a mix of both.

 

He felt lightheaded, dizzy, and he trembled so bad, shook with such intensity that he couldn't focus on his hands as he drew them back to look at them with wide eyes. --then again, his vision could have just been swimming too. Perhaps both. He didn't know, and it didn't matter to him.

 

Eiji looked over at the arm lying next to him. Even if Ankh couldn't properly emote, properly express himself as an arm, he looked tired, exhausted, all of the pain transferring to him as mental stress. Eiji wiped his hands on his pants, and, shaking near violently, gently rest a hand on one of the small wings adorning Ankh.

 

The vertigo grew worse. Blood trickled freely down his stomach, legs and back, spilling without care onto the sheets. The nausea creeped up faster on him too, and he brought his free hand to his mouth again, shutting his eyes and holding it down, just barely, until it was too much, and he vomited again. He felt sopping wet, and too dizzy to sit up anymore, too weak to hold himself and his extremities in place. He felt stupid, too, for telling Ankh what he did--but he supposed it had been then or never.

 

"S... Sorry, Ankh... for... thi..." He trailed off, unable to complete the word or sentence. He fell back, eyes rolling in the back of his head, and the hand slipped off the wing, growing limp. His breath shallow, darkness overtook him.

 

Dizzy and overwhelmed, Ankh paid little attention to his surroundings before the hand touched him. Too tired to react, he just lay there. “Eiji…” He repeated wearily, not looking at the man. “Did you… mean that…?” But moments after asking, Eiji’s hand slipped from its position on his arm. He gathered the strength to look back at him, and seeing him unconscious, gave a frustrated sigh.

 

After taking another moment to recover, Ankh dragged himself to the edge of the bed, slowly making his way back over to Shingo. Moments later, and he staggered back to the bed, feeling exhausted despite the good health of the detective’s body.

 

He sank to his knees in front of the bed a moment, placing his hand over one of Eiji’s lightly. Knitting his eyebrows together, Ankh shut his eyes. “I… I also…” Words died in his throat before he could get them out. Even to an unconscious man, he couldn’t yet say it. How pathetic.

 

After a moment or two, he pushed himself reluctantly to his feet, surveying the mess. Hina was… not going to be happy.

 

He couldn’t do anything about the fitted sheets, not with Eiji laying on them and moving him not being an option. But he stripped off the blankets, dumping them in a pile by the door. He moved Eiji just enough to prop up pillows under him, as he’d seen Hina do before. With the rest of the blankets in the room unavailable, he pulled blankets from his perch, including the bright red one that draped over it, and covered Eiji with those. He didn’t know anything about tending to wounds, so there was little else he could do in the room, now.

 

So, Ankh turned to leave, to find Hina, and wash the blood from his hands. He paused at the door, glancing back at Eiji with a deep frown. ...He couldn’t think about /that/ now, there were more pressing things to attend to.

 

Fortunately (or unfortunately) for Ankh, Hina had just returned from school. Though she didn't have a shift that night, she couldn't leave Eiji in just /Ankh's/ incapable hands, and asking Chiyoko to do it was out of the question. So, of course, she stopped by, bringing by lots of blankets, lots of bandages, lots of small snacks she would think Eiji would enjoy--and hopefully, just hopefully, Eiji would be awake to eat them.

 

When she closed the front door behind her, she turned around, her eyes meeting Ankh's. And, right away, she knew something was wrong. Her eyes fell from his, scanning over him, and when she saw the red on his hands and clothes, everything she was carrying fell to the ground with a soft thud.

 

"A-Ankh!" she cried out, jumping over the stuff and rushing to him. She didn't enter Eiji's room just yet--whether it was out of fear that Eiji had...well... or not was unknown to her. She grabbed onto Ankh's shirt and, quite forcefully, dragged her brother's body down to her level. "Wh... What's wrong?! Is Eiji... Is Eiji alright? What did you do to him?!"

 

Irrational things ran through her mind, then--did Ankh finally use this as a chance and let his Greeed nature overtake him, killing Eiji in his moment of weakness? She worked under the assumption that Eiji was already pushing up daisies, and her lips formed a tight line. She said nothing more to Ankh; instead, she pushed him away (careful not to hurt him) and barged into the room.

 

Eiji was asleep, it seemed--but where did all that blood come from? It smelled horrible in there, too, and she took one step, two, three tentative steps towards the bed until she reached it. She hesitated in reaching down, but with forced resolve, she pulled the blankets back.

 

She tried to stay quiet, but the sight was absolutely /gruesome/. She dropped the hem of the blanket, both hands going to her mouth in shock, and she moved backwards until the dresser behind her stopped. Her eyes darted everywhere but at the wound, everywhere but at the blood stains, which was a lot harder than she thought it would be. At least, she noticed, he still breathed.

 

In a hushed tone, she turned to Ankh, taking a few steps towards him. "Th... This is bad!" She sounded so upset. "We need... We need someone... we can't take him to the hospital, though... Ah, Date-san!" She rushed out of Eiji's room and shut the door behind her. "We have to contact Date-san or Gotou-san. I'll..."

 

She was scared to leave Eiji alone, and she was scared to leave Ankh here alone with him too. Acting in sheer panic, an idea came to mind, and she spun Ankh around towards the door.

 

"Ankh, please go find Date-san. Hurry."

 

Ankh opened his mouth, trying to find any words to explain, to create an excuse, but he found himself at a loss. “It… it was an accident,” was all he managed, voice strangely apologetic. “He… I didn’t mean to…” Taking a deep breath, Ankh tried to compose himself, uncomfortable with Hina seeing him so perturbed. “He’s not dead. I didn’t…”

 

Falling silent, he followed Hina as she moved through rooms, expression unreadable. He felt… guilty. If he hadn’t been so stupid, if he had just let it go and distanced himself and /not/ let his concern get to him, then it would’ve been fine.

 

He tried once again in his mind to formulate an explanation. /Well, Hina, I ignored your warnings, was swayed by disgusting human emotions, and in an attempt to help Eiji nearly killed him instead./ No, that still sounded too… bad. And at that, he felt that whatever he said, she wouldn’t be happy. She’d asked him what he’d done to Eiji, looked at Ankh with horror and accusation. It was with good reason that Hina was suspicious, and with good reason that she blamed him. So all he could do was stay silent, stare anywhere but her or Eiji or his bloodied hands.

 

At her command, Ankh just nodded mutely, stumbling towards the door. Pulling it open, he stepped outside, breathing in fresh air. It hadn’t occurred to him how stifling it had gotten in there. Ankh leaned against the door, pulling his phone from his pocket and beginning to dial in a number. Date had given his number to Eiji for emergencies, but as Eiji didn’t have a phone, the number was in Ankh’s phone. He could’ve just as easily made the call inside, but the tenseness in Hina’s manner made him feel that he wouldn’t be welcome there.

 

At the sound of the doctor’s voice on the other end, a casual ‘Ah, Hino?’, Ankh spoke. “His… Eiji’s condition is worse,” he said briefly. Date sounded surprised to hear Ankh’s voice, which made sense, because the Greeed didn’t often speak to him or Gotou even when they were working together. But Date quickly promised to be over as fast as he could, and with that promise, Ankh hung up. He glanced at the door, before turning away, hands in his pockets. He didn’t feel up to answering questions or hearing accusations right now, other things on his mind now that Eiji was taken care of. So he decided that he’d go up to the roof, wait there for a while. After everyone calmed down and left, he could slip back in.

 

Then… well, hopefully Eiji would be too tired to be interested in talking again, if he was awake. On the downside, that would mean that Ankh wouldn’t be able to ask him anything. Had he really meant…? Ankh scowled, feeling frustration well up inside of him. ...Why had he said that?

 


	2. Chapter 2

After all was said and done, after Date and Gotou had left several hours later, and Hina reluctantly left, giving instructions to Chiyoko that Eiji was super sick and was to be left alone, Eiji slept peacefully in the bed. Date had given him some pain medication, something a lot stronger than what he had been previously given, and he could finally sleep.

 

He dreamt. He dreamt for what felt like a very long time. Of nothing in particular. Just a normal day. Ankh was there in every scene. Occasionally with Hina, occasionally with Gotou and Date, with Chiyoko, with Kougami and Satonaka. He dreamed of lunch and dinner, of late nights playing board games after the restaurant was closed, of Ankh, after releasing Shingo for the night and after they were sure no one would come into their room, snuggling up against Eiji's face and sleeping together.

 

At that, his eyes opened very slowly, as if he were sleeping beauty, staying lidded, not opening al the way. A hand sluggishly went up to touch the side of his face dream Ankh had been pressed against. Disappointed by the lack of warmth, his hand fell back down.

 

He had been briefly aware of the voices of Date, Gotou and Hina that had crowded around him. But most of his memories prior to that had been erased neatly, the pain having been too much to categorize and store anything. All he remembered was... Ankh handing him a shirt, and then he woke up here and now, sedated by the medication.

 

"... Ankh..." he called out weakly. His voice scratched at his throat, hoarse, tasted awful, and he ignored the heavy scent of blood hanging in the air. He could see the perch from here, but he had trouble focusing on it, but he did notice two things: One, Ankh wasn't there, and two, the red blanket was gone.

 

His eyes scanned the room, slowly, very slowly, and when he looked down at himself, he noticed the red blanket was draped over him.

 

"... Ankh...?" he repeated, even quieter.

 

It had finally grown late enough that everyone had dispersed. So Ankh climbed down from his spot on the roof, nimbly climbing down to the window to the back room. Climbing in through said window, Ankh glanced around the room. It was indeed empty, save the man in the bed. He thought he was asleep, until he heard him speak.

 

He paused, staying silent as he shut the window behind him and walked over. “I’m here.” He stood a careful distance from Eiji. “How… are you feeling?” He asked slowly. His eyes flickered to the wound, or rather, where he remembered it being, as Eiji’s torso was covered by blankets now.

 

He wasn’t sure how he expected Eiji to react. Would he push Ankh away? It would be an understandable response. And yet… and /yet/… Ankh’s thoughts still lay in what Eiji had said. Their disastrous attempt at a possession was a bit of a blur for him later, out of the heat of the moment, although he recalled the gist of it. The clearest thing he remembered was Eiji saying that he… Suddenly frustrated, he stepped closer to the bed, although he was careful not to touch him, or sit, or do anything that would jostle him. The last thing he needed was to be responsible for Eiji getting hurt worse /again/.

 

“What did you mean?” Ankh asked suddenly, figuring that there was no point in beating around the bush. “When you said… before we separated…” He wasn’t used to having so much trouble finding words, but here he was, struggling to think of a way to /not/ say something like ‘You know, when you said that you loved me.’

 

So he fell silent, watching Eiji carefully. Hopefully he’d be able to recall it without Ankh having to specify what exactly he had said.

 

Eiji tilted his head just a little, towards Ankh's voice, in almost desperate attempt to look at him, to see him, to make sure that he really was there. His vision swam, but he could focus, at least, on the curls of his blond hair, and a warm smile plastered itself on his face, as a warm fondness washed over him.

 

"Ankh... you're here... I'm glad..." All of his speech was really drawn out, really slow, but not so calculated. He talked, but didn't think about it, didn't have the mental capacity to think about it. He just kept smiling a stupid, goofy smile at Ankh, rambling on about something that didn't make a lick of sense, as if he had just gotten his teeth pulled.

 

Ankh stepped closer, and he asked that question that interrupted Eiji's low ramblings. Eiji looked up at him, blinking a few times. Now that Ankh was next to him, he could see him clearer, see him as he should be seen. But--But, it did puzzle him. What did Ankh mean...?

 

"Huh...?" he breathed out, furrowing his brows, face appearing younger with how easy he looked, how relaxed. "Separated...?" He reached out a hand, missed once or twice, before his nimble fingers finally latched onto the hem of the Greeed's shirt.

 

"We're not separate... right? We're... here together, now... Hehe..." He really was off his rocker. What had Date even given him?! He tugged weakly, very, very gently, on the shirt. "Come... closer... Ankh."

 

Ankh stared, baffled. What the hell had the others done to him? He was probably on some... drug of some kind for the pain, he reasoned, drawing on the detective’s memories of hospitals and past injuries.

 

Ankh paused then, looking at the man with suspicion. Would he be able to get anything through Eiji’s head right now? “Are you even listening to me?” He asked this more as a disgruntled aside to himself than an actual question to the other. Looking at him, Ankh had to resist the urge to grab Eiji and give him a good shake or something.

 

Before he could do anything else, Eiji had grabbed the hem of his shirt, and kept rambling on about only a single word of his question. “...Yeah, sure, we’re not separate now, but I mean...”

 

Giving a frustrated sigh, he reached down to grab Eiji’s hand and try to remove it from his shirt. “No,” he replied curtly to the request. Given what had happened /last/ time, he was a little reluctant to get too close again.

 

Eiji was being stupid, but in a different way than usual. Could he get a straight answer out of him at all right now? "...Do you remember what happened?" He decided to try this question first, then go from there.

 

He pouted when Ankh refused his request. Did he not want to be around Eiji? Was he only there because Hina had asked him to stay? Eiji's pout only grew further when Ankh removed his hand—which, unfortunately for Ankh, allowed him to grab onto Ankh's hand and hold onto it surprisingly tight. He wasn't going to let go anytime soon, it seemed.

 

"Cmon... Don't you wanna be here?" is what he tried to say, what he thought he said, but it might've come out a little more slurred than intended. He squeezed Ankh's hand and smiled up at him, the skin around his eyes crinkling.

 

At the next question, Eiji only got more confused and puzzled. "Remember...?" he echoed, looking away with furrowed brows. Even in the medication induced haze, he knew that there was a rather large gap in his memory. He lay there, thinking hard, face scrunching up.

 

He could remember bits and pieces now. After Ankh helped him change, they talked (he couldn't remember the topic of the conversation). The pain was awful. Ankh possessed him to help alleviate the pain, but even he couldn't handle it. And, in an attempt to get Ankh to listen—

 

The smile returned to his face as his eyes lit up, a metaphorical lightbulb flickering over his head. Eiji met Ankh's eyes again, slow and earnest, without a care in the world.

 

"Oh..." he started. "That was the... first time I said I love you... wasn't it...? Though... I've been meaning to... say it for awhile..."

 

He /knew/ he shouldn’t have gotten any closer, Ankh cursed internally as Eiji grabbed his hand. To make matters worse, the idiot was /smiling/ at him when Ankh looked down at him. He attempted very stubbornly to keep his expression blank. It only partly worked, as Ankh couldn’t keep a scowl of frustration off his face. “This is my room too, you know,” he said a little defensively. “There are other reasons for me to be here besides wanting to.” But Ankh never did anything he didn’t want to do, if he could help it.

 

Impatiently, Ankh waited as Eiji thought, thinking with irritation that considering his state, they’d probably be here all night before they got anywhere in… whatever Ankh was trying to accomplish. He wasn’t sure himself what he was looking for here, what he wanted. Well, he wanted an answer from Eiji, but after that… He had no clue what he would do.

 

If the words had been imagined, if Eiji had just been saying it to make him stop, then... he’d drop it. This whole infatuation was stupid and useless, any excuse to just forget it would be a welcome one. Yet… In the impossible event that Eiji had actually said it, and if he /meant/ it… What would Ankh…?

 

Drawn out of his thoughts by Eiji’s voice, he looked at him again. Unfortunately, he chose to meet Eiji’s gaze just as the man spoke with that infuriatingly earnest look on his infuriatingly kind face, confirming what was both Ankh’s worst fear, and the thing he’d hoped most desperately to hear.

 

At a loss for words, Ankh just stared at Eiji, mouth open slightly. This had to be a joke. Or a dream, or /any/ kind of lie. But it wasn’t.

 

“You… meant it, then?” Ankh spoke finally after a long pause, furrowing his brow. “...Why?” There were a hundred other questions he could ask, but those two more general ones rose to the surface foremost. He found himself leaning closer to hear the answer, a scowl unconsciously returning to his face, born more out of confusion than any anger or irritation.

 

Ankh sounded upset. Oh, no. Eiji frowned, looking hurt himself, as if Ankh being hurt hurt him—and it did, in this case. Did Ankh not love him? He messed up. But... He just thought he should say it at least once before he died. Even if Ankh didn't love him, or couldn't love him, he wanted to say it. He was glad to have Ankh here, by his side, even if he did get dragged into all sorts of crazy stuff.

 

He nodded, tugging on Ankh's hand, trying to pull him closer—too bad the tugs were too weak to do anything. He didn't realize that, though. He just wanted Ankh closer, finally, in this vulnerable state he was in, to hold him and tell him he'd be fine, that he'd live, that Ankh was glad to be here too.

 

"Yeah," he confirmed, voice hoarse. The medication's side effects were beginning to wear off. It was easier to think, clearer, and he squeezed Ankh's hand again. "I meant it." And he did, of course.

 

But... The second question caught him off guard. That really was a stupid question, he thought. Why? Why what...? Why did he love him? He really didn't have an answer, didn't have a clue how he could put in words that Ankh would understand—and he was still hazy enough to get his words mixed up.

 

"Why... Because..." His eyes flicked to the ceiling, a small smile on his face, sort of sad. "Because... I do. Because you're always there. Very easily always there. I like that you're warm—the... the fire in your arm, it's nice. You're... A little rough around the edges but... I like that." Eiji looked back up at Ankh, earnest again, genuine—lovingly.

 

"I love you because I do."

 

Ankh was silent, staring at Eiji with a slight frown. He dropped his gaze from him after a moment, looking down at their hands. He wasn’t sure what to say. He had never expressed feelings like this before, never had any cause or chance to.

 

Eiji meant it. And the confirmation was simultaneously terrifying and exhilarating. He looked back up long enough to catch the last of Eiji’s words, and the look he gave him. Every reason made him feel a little warmer in the pit of his stomach, but at the same time baffled him.

 

He could think of a hundred reasons why Eiji wouldn’t love him, easily. And very few logical reasons why he would. But as he tried to explain to himself why he loved Eiji in turn, he found himself similarly unsure as to how to put it into words. Maybe that was just normal for the feeling of love. He sank down to sit on the bed, continuing to stare at their hands.

 

Eiji was warm too, he thought a little dazedly. A heat radiated from Eiji’s hand in his currently human one that made Ankh hold his hand more tightly, drawing it closer to him and placing his other hand over Eiji’s.

 

“I…” He hesitated, shutting his eyes. It was hard to muster the words that felt so foreign and clumsy on his tongue, and even harder to just /consider/ looking at Eiji while saying them. Even just like this, Ankh couldn’t recall any time he’d felt this vulnerable. It was scary.

 

After a long moment of silence, Ankh opened his eyes, brushing a thumb over the back of Eiji’s palm lightly. “Eiji, I…” he started again, head ducked down, and voice very quiet. “I think... that Greeed can fall in love.” Another pause, and he kept his gaze on their hands, the curtain of curls that fell over his face shielding his eyes from Eiji. His heart in his throat, he tried to continue, because wouldn’t it be better to be as forward as he usually was, and just tell him directly that he felt the same? But this was hard, for some reason. Too hard.

 

So he just held Eiji’s hand, silent. Ankh tilted his head back up slightly after a moment to glance at Eiji, uncertain and searching for a reaction.

 

‘I think... that Greed can fall in love.’

 

It was a simple statement, but it had Eiji's heat racing. Event through the medicated haziness, he could infer as to what that meant. His thoughts muddled together, and he couldn't think straight, could think only of what this meant, what Ankh meant, how warm his hand felt in between Ankh's own.

 

Ankh was gentle. Eiji loved it. Eiji loved this side of Ankh, because it proved that Greeed were closer to humans than most people would think. Despite Ankh saying that Greeed can't feel emotions the same way, Eiji was sure of it. Ankh was a living testament to that. Maybe it was just because he possessed Eiji and Shingo so much.

 

Regardless, Ankh was human, in a way, and even if he wasn't, Eiji would love him.

 

The look of surprise on his face faded away, replaced by another smile. Eiji squeezed Ankh's hand, and he desperately wished he could sit up to hug him, to embrace Ankh with his own two arms and hold him there, to let him know that he was loved.

 

A knock on the door crudely interrupted the moment. Eiji withdrew his hand in shock, placing it across his chest, pointedly looking at Hina, the visitor, rather than at Ankh. He supposed he would be less awkward than Ankh would be, so he greeted her, a little nervously.

 

Hina's eyes lit up. "Ah, you're awake, Eiji-kun!" she said, clapping her hands together as she walked over to the both of them. "Make sure to get rest this time, okay? A good night's sleep will do you well." She turned to Ankh, hands on her hips. "It's time for Shingo to go home, now."

 

When Eiji smiled at him, Ankh found himself relaxing. He lifted his head, only to glance away again, flustered now. Well, that was out there now. No going back. The only question was… now what? He took a deep breath, preparing to say… something, anything, even if it was just Eiji’s name, or something stupid. But whatever Ankh might have planned to do next, it was interrupted by the visitor. He gave an irritated huff as Eiji pulled his hand from his, and was sorely tempted to grab it again until he remembered that they weren’t alone now.

 

Stiffening a little, he didn’t turn to look at Hina, convinced that if he did, she’d somehow /know/. And, obviously, nobody could know about this. It would be too embarrassing, cause no end of mockery from everyone else. Who had ever heard of a lovesick Greeed? So Ankh didn’t move, tensely staring at the wall behind Eiji until he was spoken to.

 

Oh. Right. He’d forgotten, honestly. Ankh didn’t usually mind giving up Shingo for the night. There was little one could do while asleep, not many interesting tastes or smells or the like that would make a human body necessary. But thinking now about the feeling of Eiji’s hand between his, Ankh was tempted to refuse. Not that that would keep her from separating them. Hina’s insistence that her brother not spend every waking moment with Ankh was one of the first conditions that had been set for this whole arrangement.

 

“Fine,” he grumbled, laying his Greeed arm on the bed before he detached himself, the man changing from blond to brunette as he collapsed briefly. A few moments later, his eyelids fluttered, and Shingo sat up, looking dazed. “He’s probably still out of it,” Ankh muttered, not even bothering to float and just laying on the blankets, demeanor rather like that of a sulky teenager.

 

“Oh, I’m fine!” Shingo assured quickly, although he still staggered a little standing up. He greeted his sister warmly, before giving Eiji a polite nod. “I hope you feel better, Eiji-san. Both of you have a good night!” He directed a polite smile towards Ankh, who just ignored him, still grumbling under his breath. “Er, I don’t think I’ve left anything here, so… I’m ready to go home whenever you are, Hina.”

 

Ankh, still sulking, wished they would leave quickly, both for the sake of his own embarrassment--because Shingo may have been solidly locked out of Ankh’s mind, but he wasn’t /blind/--and because, well... he wanted to be alone with Eiji again.

 

Hina held an arm out, catching her brother before he could fall too much or to the side. He didn't need to be injured, too. She sighed with relief (as she always did, doing this) when it turned out he /was/ fine, that Ankh hadn't hurt him or push him around too much. Once Shingo had stood on his own, she went over to fix Eiji's blankets, tucking him in even further.

 

"I'll check on you tomorrow morning, okay?" she offered, and Eiji nodded.

 

"As long as you aren't late for class. I'm fine now, really, thanks to Date-san."

 

"Still!" She huffed, crossed her arms over her chest, but the pout was short-lived, and she smiled back down at Eiji, taking a few steps back towards Shingo once more. She glanced at Ankh, but she said nothing. Whatever happened to Eiji seemed to have taken its toll on the Greeed, too, she surmised. "Well, good night. Sleep well, Eiji-kun. Call if you need anything."

 

And with that, she grabbed her brother by the arm, tugging him out, shutting off the lights (as Eiji had asked), and closing the door. Eiji only let out the breath he didn't know he had been holding until he heard the front door of the restaurant click locked. He stared up at the ceiling, eyes adjusting to the darkness, before he started to laugh.

 

"I guess I'm a little shy too, huh?" Who would've thought that Eiji Hino would be shy. Then again, this still was his first time feeling the unfamiliar tug of romantic love. Everything was so new to him. He was glad, though, that Ankh and him were alone once more. He brushed his fingers against Ankh's own, not noticing that he was trembling.

 

"I love you, Ankh," he caught himself saying hurriedly. Something fluttered in his chest. The novelty of the phrase hadn't worn off yet.

 

Ankh relaxed when the two left, as much as an arm could show visible relaxation. “/I’m/ not shy,” he muttered, sounding defensive. “I just... don't need the others asking stupid questions, it'd be irritating." At Eiji's touch, he reached out to his lace his own fingers through Eiji's, catching his hand. Ankh felt a little concern at feeling Eiji tremble, but he was also reluctant to suggest that the man get rest. He wanted Eiji to stay with him longer.

 

Listening quietly as Eiji said those impossible words again, Ankh squeezed his hand, feeling warmth spread through him. He really liked the way those words sounded. They were a little distant and distorted, Eiji's voice not as clear as it would have been if Ankh was still attached to the detective, but for some reason he didn't mind it that much.

 

He thought for a moment, trying to find the words to respond. Right now, it truly was just the two of them. He looked at Eiji, the darkness of the room only worsening his muddled vision. Despite the lack of clarity with which he perceived the man, so stifled in his Greeed senses, Ankh tried to memorize every detail of the moment. Even like this, he treasured just being able to see Eiji at all, to be able to feel him there and listen to his voice. That didn’t alleviate the longing to be able to more strongly feel these things, but it lessened the ache.

 

He wondered if he’d wake up in the morning and find this to be some ridiculous dream, because it still confused him, how Eiji could love a cold, monstrous pile of medals. Even when he wore a human face, he was still decidedly inhuman. Violent, caring so little for others, and lacking many of the things that made humans like each other. These weren’t observations that Ankh thought with self-deprecation per se, just things he’d always considered to be true. And yet, Eiji had for some reason seen all this and still decided that he loved him.

 

He really was a fool. But Ankh was glad that he was.

 

“I… love you too,” he mumbled finally, squeezing Eiji’s hand again. The tighter Ankh held it, the more he could feel (even if /just/ a little more) his touch.

 

Eiji rested his hand in Ankh's. The warmth from the arm spread up his arm, blossomed in his chest, traveled all the way to his toes. He felt like he was exaggerating, but he really did feel the warmth, feel it radiate throughout him. When Ankh squeezed his hand, he squeezed back, as hard as he could (which wasn't that hard, given his weakness at the moment) to make sure that Ankh felt it, that it would get through to him.

 

They sat in comfortable silence for several minutes, the moment dragging on and on. Eiji decided it would be alright if this moment dragged on forever. He wouldn't mind one bit--he'd encourage it, encourage time to stand still so that he and Ankh could stay like this forever.

 

That was a bit of a fluffy thought, wasn't it? He hadn't felt like this in--no, he hadn't /ever/ felt quite like this. Perhaps the medicine was blowing this out of proportion--but Eiji liked to think that it wasn't, that this was how it would feel all the time, and he liked it.

 

When Ankh broke the silence to say those words, Eiji's stomach tightened. The warmth blossomed in his chest again, and he was at a loss of what to say. It was a shame that Eiji had to become so near fatally injured for this to transpire--but Eiji didn't mind the injury anymore. It was fate, it seemed.

 

Eiji squeezed Ankh's hand back before pulling his hand up, still laced with Ankh's own fingers. He only let go of the Greeed briefly to place Ankh's open palm against his face, nuzzling into the warmth it provided. Any other human might find the touch of a Greeed disgusting, cold, inhuman, but Eiji did not. Especially with Ankh. His talons were human enough, weren't they?

 

He only found out that he was crying when he hiccupped. Keeping one hand on Ankh, he wiped the tears away with his other hand. "S... Sorry."

 

And he knew why he was crying, too, but he decided not to think about that.

 

Ankh started a little in surprise at the gesture, but didn’t draw away, cupping the side of Eiji’s face and brushing his thumb down his cheek carefully. He took care not to accidentally cut him, suddenly entirely too aware of the sharpness of his talons. He thought a little dryly that Greeed really hadn’t been designed with things like cuddling in mind.

 

But they seemed to be making it work well enough, even if the absence of his body was even more glaring to him in this situation. He would’ve liked to be able to… just hold Eiji, or anything like that. But that wasn’t really possible here, so Ankh settled with letting himself be held, the rest of his forearm nestled into Eiji’s side.

 

He was just finding himself finally at peace, wondering if he’d fall asleep here when he felt something wet underneath his hand. Realizing then as well that Eiji was crying, Ankh drew back slightly. What was wrong? As far as Ankh knew, humans most often cried when upset in some way. so what had happened? At the apology, he only found himself further confused.

 

He had to wonder a bit if he’d said something incorrect, although he had only spoken very briefly. Had he hurt Eiji without realizing it? It was easy for Ankh to overlook things like that, to be insensitive. And he’d never really minded it, because he’d never really had any cause to think of it as a bad thing until now. But right now, he wasn’t just thinking of himself, feeling concern for the man next to him.

 

“What?” He asked, the words coming out a little more demanding than he’d intended. He didn’t want Eiji to be upset, not when he finally seemed to not be in as much pain anymore. If he could find out what was wrong, he could do something about it, Ankh reasoned.

 

Ankh had pulled away, and Eiji sniffled. The tears had been brief and light--nothing compared to the tears from earlier, caused by pain--and by the time Ankh asked his question with the singular word, he had all but stopped entirely. Just a few stray ones here and there.

 

"I-I'm fine. Sorry if I worried you..." His voice cracked. He was smiling so much, such a big, goofy smile, and he wondered if Ankh could even see it in the dark. How did Ankh even see in the first place? Greeed were so interesting, Ankh especially, and Eiji wanted to know more.

 

"I'm just...happy, you know. I haven't..." There was a bloated pause, as he sniffled again, thinking of how to phrase this. "I haven't felt like this...for a very, very long time." And truth be told--he hadn't. Not since before Africa. He had gotten close several times before, but it had always been just that: close. Now he didn't know what to think of it.

 

"So I'm glad."

 

He pulled Ankh away from him, using both hands, holding him very gently, mindful of the scales and everything else that made a Greeed a Greeed. Eiji smiled up at him and leaned up, pulling Ankh down whether he wanted to or not, to kiss the center of Ankh's open palm. It was chaste, and brief, but it held a lot of meaning, and Eiji didn't feel silly at all.

 

He settled Ankh back down in the crook of his neck, keeping both hands on him protectively.

 

Ankh couldn’t quite make out the smile, but the tone of Eiji’s voice told him that there wasn’t a need to worry. “Oh.” He thought about what Eiji had said, a little confused at first as to why something like this might bring him to tears. It was comforting to hear, though, that Ankh wasn’t the only one new to this.

 

He was mulling over this when Eiji pulled him up and closer, and Ankh had no time to voice any protest before he leaned up and /kissed/ him. It felt… strange. Not bad or unpleasant, but a completely foreign sensation all the same. He tried to recall any prior knowledge he had of things like kisses. The detective had memories here and there, but Ankh didn’t really pry into useless things like that. So he had really no frame of reference for what it was supposed to be like. But he certainly understood what Eiji meant, and that alone made him feel butterflies in his metaphorical stomach.

 

He twisted a little in Eiji’s grasp when it was over, appearing as flustered as it was possible for an arm to emote. “Well I-- I’m glad, then, that you’re glad,” he managed, mumbling through his embarrassment.

 

That sounded rather stupid, now that he thought about it, but he couldn’t really think of anything else to respond to the kiss or the words prior to it with. He allowed himself to be set down in the crook of Eiji’s neck, and he nestled in there, gladly soaking up the warmth and the overall feeling of being in Eiji’s presence.

 

“I’ve… I’ve never felt like this before,” he told Eiji in turn, feeling that it might be a little obvious, but worth saying. There had been the human child, so long ago, but that was a platonic kind of affection, and the thought of feeling any sort of positive feeling for his former comrades was laughable. There had been the original OOOs, but he couldn’t say he’d ever felt any kind of real love for that man, even before his betrayal. Ankh shifted a little in discomfort, wishing he hadn’t recalled him, especially right now.

 

Ankh being so flustered was cute, Eiji had to admit. Ankh didn't get flustered that much, especially with Eiji in the vicinity. It was nice to know that they both could be so open to one another now, even if it was dark, even if Ankh was just a hand. He knew Ankh would listen to him in the dark, when they were alone, and it was comforting.

 

Eiji sighed a little when Ankh settled down himself, nestling as if he really were a bird. Eiji had often thought about getting a pet bird, but now that Ankh seemed to be affectionate at the moment, he decided he needed no other bird.

 

He stroked one of Ankh's wings. "Neither have I... It's nice, you know?" he said, mumbling. He paused to yawn, bringing his other hand up to his mouth. He was, honestly, surprised he had lasted this long, and he shut his eyes. He yawned again when he opened his mouth to say something, and laughed a little.

 

"I hope this... never... ends..." was the last thing he said, in a sleepy stupor, and in the next few minutes, his chest rose and fell silently, breathing easy. The sleep took him quite easily. The hand stroking Ankh's wing had fallen to gently rest on him, a loose grip on the wrist area.

 

Ankh gave a mumbled “Yeah,” to both sentiments. It still felt strange to be so open, so vulnerable, but he’d grown to trust Eiji a lot more than he thought he would when they’d first met. He was comfortable around him. It was difficult /not/ to become comfortable with someone after sharing a body with them so often, after all. So finally, after wrestling with all his worries on the subject, he figured that if it was just the two of them, it would be alright to let these kinds of feelings show.

 

He had to admit he was glad when Eiji drifted off, though. He was finding himself out of anything else to say, tired and drained by the events of the day. Greeed didn’t particularly need sleep, and Ankh really could have just sat there all night, but instead, he allowed himself to start to fall asleep too.

 

Blearily, in a far corner of his mind, Ankh thought that he should move, just in case anyone came in in the morning or anything like that. But the rest of his mind decidedly ignored this. He wanted to stay here, to be with Eiji. It was warmer here than in his perch, and much more comfortable.

 

So Ankh didn’t move, letting sleep overtake him as well. He pushed his hand further into the crook of Eiji’s neck, indeed rather like some kind of insistently affectionate bird. Feeling oddly at peace for the first time in… a long, long time, his vision slowly darkened, until he too slept deeply, curled against the human like he was the last anchor Ankh had to this world.

 


	3. Chapter 3

Eiji's healing went as expected. Apparently, itching to get back out there and fight, to take down the Yummy that had left him in this condition in the first place, somehow sped up the process. Although he was still pretty injured, he could stand and transform without too much pain.

 

He still couldn't be possessed, though. He didn't want Ankh to take over while he was in this much pain still. Ankh couldn't take the amount of pain he had been in prior, so--so he had to bear the brunt of this, no matter how much he did want Ankh to possess him for the sake of possessing him. He missed the feeling, honestly.

 

They did hold hands in private, though, especially at night. That was nice. Eiji seemed to relax more and more each time they did it, and the novelty of those three words still hadn't worn off. He liked saying the L word as if it were about to go out of style and he needed to get as much use out of it as he could.

 

Finally, though, they tracked down the Yummy--who had apparently been defeated by Date and Gotou. At least Eiji could rest easy about that, now. There was still the problem that, by defeating that Yummy, Gotou had gone out of commission because of breaking his wrist. So Eiji had to get back into the groove of things quick, to help out Date.

 

He was somewhat thankful when there was news of a Yummy attack. He had grabbed Ankh by the arm (Shingo's arm) and practically dragged him to where it was, nearly wrestling the medals out of Ankh's hand.

 

"Transform!" The familiar tune of Tatoba played, and he felt ready to rock and roll. The Yummy seemed to be an easy one, compared to the last one he had fought, though he still couldn't tell whose it was. It fell easily, with only a few medal changes here and there, though Eiji panted and huffed by the end of the fight, holding himself around the stomach with one hand.

 

He was just about to cancel the transformation when something caught his ear. It was a rustling, as if someone else was also there. He took a step closer to Ankh, putting himself in between the Greeed and the newcomer.

 

"Hoooh~?" Kazari's smirk darkened the features of the face he stole. "Are you scared of me now, or something, Ankh?"

 

Eiji shifted into a defensive position once more, not really having the strength to talk much. "What do you want?"

 

"What do you think?"

 

Although Ankh had found other things to occupy himself with while they were out of commission, he still spent time sitting with Eiji, whenever he wasn’t kicked out by someone telling him Eiji needed to rest. He was just glad that Hina let him be around Eiji at all, after her first reaction to the failed possession. But she’d taken it well once it was explained, and not chased Ankh out.

 

Although this Yummy was fairly easy to take down, Ankh was still slightly on edge throughout the fight. He observed it carefully, searching for any sign of injury on Eiji, any way the fight could go sour. When it went smoothly, he let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding.

 

At the sight of the newcomer, however, Ankh bristled, fixing his gaze on the other Greeed and tracking his movements. With the implication that he was /afraid/, Ankh just sneered at him, sorely tempted to tell Eiji to go ahead and beat some medals out of Kazari for it.

 

But he'd noted the way Eiji had held his stomach by the end of fight, and looking at Kazari now... Well, a Greeed was an entirely different fight than a Yummy. If Eiji strained himself too much, he'd certainly reopen his wound.

 

So Ankh grabbed Eiji's armored shoulder, pulling him back slightly. "We're leaving," he muttered to him, keeping a suspicious gaze on Kazari. Then, raising his voice, he spoke to the other Greeed.

 

"As fun as it sounds to squabble over medals, I'm afraid we don't have time for you today, Kazari. Why don't you go find something else to amuse yourself with? Like a ball of yarn, perhaps."

 

Eiji gave one glance at Ankh before turning his attention back to Kazari. He really didn't need this today--he had had a really awful feeling all day today, unrelated to the pain flare ups. He didn't tell Ankh about this, though, as he really didn't need the Greeed to force him to stay inside until it passed.

 

The awful feeling kept his feet cemented to the muddy ground, even after Ankh said they were leaving.

 

Kazari's face did not react to the thrown out insult at first; he slowly drew in his eyebrows, crossing his arms over his chest. He leaned forward a bit. "I'll let you in on a little secret, Ankh," he said, pretty quietly, but enough that both of them could hear. "After that, you can go back to being fed seed in the park."

 

He took a step forward, Eiji, a step back, closer to Ankh. Eiji reached behind him to grab a hold of Ankh's wrist, just to make sure he wasn't limp or anything, to make sure he was still okay. He shifted until he was standing completely between Ankh and Kazari.

 

The enemy Greeed simply smiled. "Here it is," and he paused for dramatic effect. The smile on his face dripped off and was replaced by a scowl. "Do you really think I am above letting you go while you're wounded?"

 

He wasted no time in changing forms, running at the pair as he did so. Eiji brought up the Medajaribur, letting go of Ankh to meet Kazari's claws. He dug his heels in the ground, but Kazari pushed him back.

 

"Ankh," he muttered, desperately, "I need a combo."

 

Eiji certainly knew how dangerous it would be to use one of those. But, it was their only chance now, really. He grunted and shoved Kazari away, putting a few feet of distance in between them. Certainly enough to transform.

 

Ankh started slightly at the contact, but didn't react too openly to it. Why was Eiji being so protective over /him/ when he was the one in immediate danger here? Although, Ankh thought, they were both probably equally in trouble here.

 

Ankh's first impulse at Eiji's words was to refuse, find some other way to get out of the conflict without getting Eiji hurt even worse. Logically, of course, they needed a combo. Kazari was too strong to take on without one. That didn't mean Ankh liked the idea. "Don't push yourself too much," he muttered back, sounding entirely unhappy with this request.

 

He scowled at the back of Eiji's head as he backed away, pulling his medal case out of his jacket and flipping it open. Their options were Gamel's, Kazari's, and his own, although the medal case contained none of his.

 

After a moment of debate, he pulled out the silver medals, tossing them to the armored man with a yell of, "Eiji!"

 

Another couple steps back, just to put a safe enough distance between him and Kazari, and Ankh hung back, disgruntled. He didn't enjoy feeling so useless in the actual fight, unable to do much besides pick out the medals in a fight against someone like Kazari. But... Eiji would probably be fine. He hoped. If anything went wrong, Ankh could probably distract Kazari long enough to get them out of there. He had lost much of his power, but he hasn't lost any of his cleverness.

 

Eiji caught the medals, ejecting the ones in the driver and slipping them in. Kazari wasn't stupid, and he waited for the change before running at Eiji again. The familiar chants of "Sagouzo" were drowned out by the clashing of OOO and Greeed.

 

"Cmon, don't you wanna play right, OOOs?" Kazari taunted, taking a few steps back, in his usual playful tone of voice. "Your technique is slipping. Who knows? Maybe you'll d—"

 

Eiji didn't reply, but he did manage to cut Kazari off, clashing with him once more. As they sparred, not so evenly matched, the awful feeling in the pit of his stomach only grew. Eiji couldn't figure out why whatever this was was bothering him so much. He couldn't even tell /what/ it was, so how could he stop it?

 

He could feel blood trickling down his skin inside the armor, pooling somewhat in the area at his hips. The adrenaline was about the only thing keeping him standing now. His attacks weakened, the more he offered, and Kazari was very clearly winning after about just ten minutes. Eiji took a step back, breath ragged, stumbling. If he didn't win, Ankh would be next—and there was no telling what the cat would do to the bird.

 

"How pathetic," Kazari sneered, shoving Eiji, who allowed it to happen, to the ground. He landed with such velocity that he heard something snap, and the medals ejected from the driver, canceling the transformation. Eiji rolled over to his side, curling up in a near fetal position, clutching at his midsection. He didn't have the heart to look up at Ankh, and he instead closed his eyes tight. "This fight wasn't very fun," continued Kazari, placing a foot on Eiji's side and pushing.

 

Eiji cried out. He then formulated it into words: "Ankh—!" Okay, just one word, before Kazari pressed harder, another snap sounding, and the awful feeling was almost too much to bear. He'd rather take the pain. He wheezed, grabbing Kazari's leg and trying to push him off, to no avail.

 

It happened quick. Far too quick for Eiji to process it. He felt the awful feeling culminate, and the feeling of something foreign, similar to possession, entering him washed over his body. When he came to, presumably a few minutes later, Kazari had been knocked back several meters, and he was transformed again.

 

"Huh?" he tried to say, but only a growl came out of his mouth. He realized quickly he wasn't in control any longer, as his legs started to move, and an axe he had never seen before was raised above his head.

 

Kazari rolled off to the side, cursing beneath his breath. "Gotta run. Bye bye." He waved once, and before the axe could collide with him darted off.

 

Eiji felt himself stop in place. The transformation was canceled, and as soon as it was, he fell to his knees. Swear poured out from every pore in his body, his face flushed bright red, and all the progress on the wound seemed to be reversed. The bad feeling was ever present, but he was too tired and weak to think about what had happened. He fell forward, not bothering to catch himself, with a soft cry of Ankh's name.

 

He shouldn’t have let him fight anymore. Ankh cursed himself as he watched, starting forward a couple times frustratedly. When the transformation was canceled, he very nearly dashed over. But what would he do? Ankh tried to formulate a plan, an idea, anything at all to get Kazari away from Eiji. He could lure him away with the medal case, maybe? Yes, that would work. But just as Ankh began to move forward, ready to get the cat’s attention, the sound of Eiji calling his name only making him want to move faster, something stopped him.

 

They were medals. Small, glinting purple medals that appeared out of nowhere, first there and then absorbed into Eiji’s body in the blink of an eye. The sight made both of the Greeed give pause, and Ankh almost took the opportunity to catch Kazari off-guard and grab Eiji. But before he could, Eiji transformed. It happened too fast for Ankh to understand exactly what had happened, but a form he had never seen before rose from the ground, before rushing at Kazari.

 

It felt… wrong. The medals, the feeling radiating from them… A creeping, cold sensation of absence seemed to reach out from the medals to touch his own core medals, making him shiver. He felt frozen, something inside of him urging him to get out, get away from this.

 

And yet, Eiji was winning now. With every strike, he was gaining the upper hand over this opponent. This should’ve made Ankh happy, and it did, of course, but the sense that something was very off didn’t leave him.

 

Nearly the moment Kazari fled and the transformation disappeared, Ankh dashed over finally, not even bothering to pretend to take his time, as he often did. Dropping to his knees before he’d stopped moving, he just barely caught Eiji before his head hit the ground. Ankh sat there for a moment, breathing hard, before he adjusted his grip, holding Eiji against him. After taking a brief moment to assure himself that Eiji was all there in one piece and still breathing, Ankh pulled back a little to look at him.

 

“What the /hell/ was that?” He started, before backpedaling quickly to the more important question. “Wait, no, don’t answer that. Are you okay?” He spoke urgently and quickly, searching Eiji’s face.

 

Eiji twisted in Ankh's arms, reaching up with one hand to grab a hold of his neck gently, to loop his arm around him and pull himself closer to him. He had to feel the warmth, feel Ankh next to him. He buried his face in the crook of his neck, and he coughed, and all his strength left him.

 

He fell somewhat limp in Ankh's arms. Breathing heavily, Eiji shut his eyes. He wasn't in too much pain, really. Taking a few breaths to himself, he lifted up his shirt to see the damage that had been done. The wound was alright, bandages still in place, and there was minimal blood. He was sure that Kazari had fractured a rib or two, but he didn't feel the pain.

 

Adrenaline still coursed through his bloodstream. Finally, he caught his breath and looked up at Ankh. "I'm... I'm... fine," he managed to get out, taking a few more breaths afterwards. "What happened? Where's... Where's Kazari?"

 

In truth, even though he had just experienced it, once the transformation had been canceled, he didn't remember most of it. Everything seemed to be in a haze once more, though this time not due to pain. He pulled his shirt down again, covering up the bandages wrapped around him. He still couldn't shake this awful feeling, terrible feeling, but with Ankh here, it didn't seem to matter.

 

Eiji took a hold of Ankh's Greeed arm, holding to close to him, feeling the warmth and desire that radiated out of it. "What about you? Did he hurt you while I was blacked out?"

 

Slight alarm sparked in him when Eiji went limp, but his movements soon after relieved Ankh’s concern that he’d fallen unconscious. Conscious was a good sign.

 

When Eiji asked what had happened, Ankh gave a huff that might’ve been a laugh. “That’s what I want to know,” he replied, a slight frown crossing his face. “Kazari ran away. You… used a combo. A new one.” But that wasn’t possible, because Ankh knew of every combo, every core medal, every Greeed. How could there be new core medals? ...There would be time to worry about that later, although the question bothered him. He put the thoughts away for the moment, focusing on Eiji.

 

He glanced down at the bandages before Eiji lowered his shirt, breathing the slightest sigh of relief. He wasn’t as hurt as Ankh had worried, thankfully. But… he could still feel that unnerving strain of hollowness. Were those medals inside of him now? Even if it was dormant now, he could sense it, just barely radiating from Eiji. He hated it. It wasn’t right to feel emptiness like this around Eiji. Even if it was just the barest trace of this feeling, it made his skin crawl.

 

But Ankh tried to dismiss this, keeping his entire attention on Eiji instead. If he focused on him, he could almost banish the cold feeling. That feeling was from those medals, not from Eiji himself, and the fact that it was so scarce and didn’t seem to affect Eiji was comforting.

 

Realizing he’d become tense, Ankh relaxed at the other man’s touch. “No. I’m fine, don’t worry,” he assured. “/You’re/ the one who’s already hurt,” he added reproachfully, scowling.

 

Eiji sat up, peeling himself away from Ankh's arms. He held his head, blood rushing to it, dizzying him. He groaned once, then took a few more breaths, then looked over and Ankh, then smiled. "I'm glad you're alright."

 

He leaned on Ankh's shoulder to stand, taking his time, but he did manage to stand all in one piece, with only minimal wincing. When Ankh stood, he leaned against the front of him, breathing evenly now. He just needed to rest for a few more minutes. He pulled away again, and he didn't seem as shaky this time.

 

"Are... you sure it was a combo? I didn't... transform myself," he said, scratching the back of his head in sheepish confusion. "I don't even... remember. I blacked out. I did, uh, well..."

 

He tried to think of how he should phrase this next bit. Could he really tell Ankh that he felt like something--or someone--else was possessing him? Especially with the new information about new medals. He glanced down at the driver, which was empty, and that put him in an even further confused state.

 

"I... felt like someone tried to possess me." He removed the OOOs Driver and held it up to the light, to inspect it, then glanced down at the ground around his feet. "Where are the new medals now?"

 

Any attempts to put the medals from his mind failed when Eiji continued to speak. “It looked like one,” he said with a shrug. “But I’ve never seen them before, so… I’m not sure.” He frowned, looking distracted now as he thought about this. Eiji’s next words only fed his concern, and he looked back at him with a searching gaze.

 

“Possess you?” He echoed, unnerved. The thought made Ankh scowl without realizing it. Someone else possessing Eiji made him feel, well, threatened. It was even moreso an unpleasant thought because of the nature of this thing, whatever it was. Whatever exuded this cold, awful feeling had no right to try and take Eiji for its host. Eiji was /his/ host, he thought a little childishly.

 

Ankh was compelled to reach out, take or even just touch Eiji’s hand, do anything to reassure himself of the other’s presence. But it was silly to become paranoid over this. They’d remove the medals, get rid of them, and then everything would be fine again. It wasn’t any big deal. What was he afraid of, that they would somehow take Eiji away from him? Ridiculous. Ankh wouldn’t allow it, and neither would Eiji, at that.

 

His scowl only deepened with Eiji’s question, and he was silent for a moment before responding. Raising his Greeed hand, he tapped a finger against Eiji’s chest lightly. “It feels like they’re... inside of you.” His brow furrowed as he dropped his hand, looking frustrated. The more they spoke on the situation, the less he liked it, and the greater his irritation grew.

 

"Yeah, possessed me," he parroted. He didn't notice Ankh's small reactions to this new bit of information. He just looked down at his hands, all scraped up from fighting, and blinked. "Same as you but... Very cold. When you possess me, it's hot." He flushed a little at that, shaking his head to clear his mind. "But I felt so cold. And only warmed up when I un-transformed. Weird."

 

He didn't really think about the implications of this all. The pain from his stomach was starting to kick in, and he found that the longer he stood there, the harder it was to focus on anything but. He reached out to Ankh, placing his hand on his shoulder, and leaned against him. His eyes focused on the ground, vision swimming for a minute.

 

"What?" Eiji nearly took a step back when Ankh touched him, only out of shock, but didn't, keeping his grip on the other (in fact, the grip tightened just a little; he was afraid, too). "Inside... Me? That doesn't make any sense... Are you sure?"

 

But now, the longer he thought about it, the more sense it made. Perhaps the medals entering him is what gave him that bad feeling (that he continued to have, ever constantly). He reached up with his other hand and clutched the shirt on his chest, looking down. Ridiculous. What sense did this even make?

 

Eiji sighed. "It'll be fine, probably," he said, if only to reassure himself. He grinned at Ankh, reached our for the talons, and when he had a loose hold of his wrist, brought it up to kiss his fingers gently. "You'll figure something out like always."

 

Ankh shrugged. "Feels like it," he repeated distractedly. They didn't seem to be bothering him, from what Ankh could see. That was good. They certainly bothered Ankh, though, setting him on edge. What /were/ these medals? They were strong, certainly, and if not for the warning bells they set off, he might’ve considered them a useful new weapon.

 

But these things weren’t like the other core medals. They were alien. Where his cores and the cores of the others pulled at desire, seeking to fill up the emptiness within them, these seemed dead, empty, devoid of desire.

 

/It’ll be fine. Probably./ Probably. If Ankh had any say in it, it would definitely turn out fine. He wouldn't allow whatever this new threat was to hurt Eiji, not while he could do anything about it. He glanced away with ill-concealed embarrassment at the kiss, and the words that followed it. "Yeah," he mumbled with a nod. Eiji's confidence eased his worry a little, but his more pragmatic side wasn't so comforted.

 

"...Come on, we need to get back so you can rest.” Ankh had been insistent on Eiji getting rest and getting better quickly before his confession, but after, this sentiment had only intensified, fueled further by his concern for Eiji himself.

 

He slipped his hand from Eiji’s grip to put it at the back of his shoulder, pushing lightly to try and maneuver him towards the motorcycle parked a little ways away.

 

Eiji brushed away Ankh's hand at the push, huffing a bit. He managed to stumble over to the motorcycle on his own just fine. Climbing on, he pursed his lips, and started the bike, motioning for Ankh to get on behind him. He muttered a "hold on" (quite frankly only because he wasn't sure how he was going to handle the bike in his condition) before zooming off.

 

Luckily, the pair made it back to Cous Coussier in one piece, even if it was a bit late, and without Eiji really messing up on driving. The rough road, however, did sort of make him even dizzier than he was before, so he waited for Ankh to stand up first, so he could use Ankh as a sort of cane, leaning heavily on him. He shut his eyes tight.

 

Once inside, he said his greetings to Chiyoko, who was closing for the night, and Hina, who was getting ready to go home, said he wasn't feeling well, and made his way to the back room. Hina tugged at Ankh, meanwhile, trying to get Ankh to let her brother go.

 

Eiji shut the door behind him, and while Hina preoccupied Ankh, began to undress. He managed to get his shirt and pants off and pull out tonight's clothes before he got too dizzy once more, leaning against the bed pole.

 

Ankh, quite frankly, was more than ready to take over driving more than once during the return trip. But Eiji was often just as stubborn as he was, and he was too busy thinking about those medals to really want to argue the point, so he just held onto Eiji, wrapped up in thought.

 

Once they had arrived, a brief squabble was carried out over letting go of the detective. Ankh lost, unsurprisingly. So, now sans Shingo, he also made his way to the back room. He gave a pause, floating in place by the door when he saw Eiji. “What’s wrong?” He asked automatically, floating closer to the man. Maybe he was being a little over-vigilant, but considering the circumstances, Ankh felt he had a good enough reason to be.

 

He almost asked if Eiji needed any help dressing, noting the clothes in his hand, but wasn’t entirely sure if he’d be able to in his current state. Perhaps with enough careful maneuvering and teamwork.

 

“...If those medals are hurting you, or causing you trouble…” He trailed off, looking off to the side. He was going to get them out, he promised himself. It would be easy enough, if he could get the medals to leave Eiji. Then it would only be a matter of grabbing them and… locking them up, preferably smashing them into very small pieces.

 

Eiji looked up at Ankh only when he started talking. Though he was sweating, he just smiled, and shook his head. "No... No, nothing's wrong," he said. "Just a little dizzy. I think I got smacked around too much..." And truthfully, that's what he thought. He wasn't thinking about the medals or anything else. He just thought he was dizzy.

 

As Ankh looked to the side, trailed off, Eiji sighed a little laugh. He pulled his shirt over his head with a grunt, then practically collapsed on the bed. He didn't quite have enough energy to put on his pants, so he just tossed them at the dresser, climbing underneath the covers.

 

"I... don't think they're doing anything," he admitted. /At least, not yet,/ he immediately followed up in thought. He still had an awful feeling all over him, down to his core. But, he was trying desperately not to think about it, not to think about anything like that. "We can figure out how to get them out tomorrow... Right now I'm tired."

 

He motioned for Ankh to shut out the light, turning on his side, hissing out a low breath at the pain, and shut his eyes tight. He hoped to sleep away this feeling--this feeling of emptiness, now that he could think about it. That's what it felt like... He wanted to feel whole, not empty.

 

Eiji left a spot open under his arm where Ankh could sneak in to snuggle close to his neck, should he choose to do so.

 

Ankh looked at him, a little relieved at the assurance. He could feel his worry begin to dissipate even further when Eiji mentioned the state of the medals. “Good,” he said, allowing relief to color his tone. They’d act quickly tomorrow, and figure out how to get them out before they /did/ start doing anything. For now, Ankh would allow himself to relax, put aside his concerns until the morning.

 

Floating over to turn off the lights, Ankh let out a quiet sigh. The thought of Eiji in danger, as much as he was loathe to admit it, scared him. Ankh didn’t like to admit to himself, or especially to anyone else when he was afraid. Eiji was more danger than he was usually in, but Ankh didn’t really count fighting as OOOs dangerous, truthfully, because it was something Ankh knew about, and Eiji could handle himself with that. This was a complete mystery, an enemy neither of them knew about. At least with Greeed, you could predict their actions.

 

He made his way back over to the bed, pausing a moment between his perch and Eiji’s bed before he went for the bed, slipping in under Eiji’s arm to bury himself into the crook of his neck. It was something that was slowly becoming familiar and comfortable, their sharing a bed.

 

More often than not, Ankh chose to sleep here now, preferring Eiji’s warmth to his perch that felt increasingly lonely. There had been a few moments where he’d nearly gotten caught in his gentleness, if he didn’t wake up early enough or had trouble burying into the covers when someone came in, but he didn’t mind it that much.

 

He breathed another barely perceptible sigh. He had to preserve this. This feeling of comfort, of safety. Ankh hadn’t felt like this… well, /ever/. And he wasn’t going to let anything take Eiji or that feeling away from him.

 

Eiji fell asleep relatively quickly. He didn't dream.

 

He also didn't wake up when the body supposedly did, when the body took careful care in not waking the Greeed arm that was so disgustingly close to him as he peeled it away, when the body sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed and just sat there.

 

That's when he, Eiji, did wake up. He started awake, jumping in place and nearly standing up in shock. How had he gotten there? He didn't remember sitting up at all, and he knew for sure that he didn't sleep walk, or sleep move, in this case.

 

But now, he was wide awake. He stood from the bed, huffing a bit, and grabbed the pants he had thrown earlier, slipping them on. At least he wasn't in too much pain.

 

For some reason, though, Eiji didn't like the darkness. Feeling as if eyes were boring into his back, he hurried out of the room, slipping through the door and turning all the lights he could on in the restaurant. He didn't look over his shoulder, and he sat on the floor, with his back against the wall, where he could see all the windows and doors. Only then did he take a deep breath, sighing it out.

 

It took Ankh a little bit to stir, but his mind blearily registering the absence of a body in the bed with him, he woke slowly. “Eiji…?” He didn’t seem to be in the room at all, from what Ankh could see looking around in the darkness. He would have frowned if he could, slowly floating up from the blankets to go towards the ajar door. Slipping through, he made his way down to the restaurant.

 

Did something happen with the medals? ...Although he’d put the medals from his mind, he had slept fitfully all the same. And unlike Eiji, he had dreamed. Nightmares, to be exact, about people long dead and thankfully so. About Eiji’s blood on his hands, and a dark, endless emptiness.

 

That was one of the definite disadvantages of spending so much time in a human body. The things humans called dreams were more often than not nightmares for Ankh.

 

But those images were gone now, just figments of his imagination.

 

With all the lights on in the restaurant, it was easy to spot the man. “Eiji?” He floated over, sinking until he was a eye level with the seated Eiji. “What’s wrong…?” After a moment of hesitation, he sank down again to place his hand over Eiji’s.

 

Eiji thought about nothing in particular, as he sat there, with his back to the wall, gaze straight ahead but unfocused on anything. He had drawn his knees up to his chest, wrapped his arms around them loosely, and he didn't realize he was trembling.

 

He jumped a little when Ankh's voice reached his ears. When Ankh touched his hand, he looked like a deer caught in the headlights. He shook his head to clear his thoughtless mind, and a smile, though somewhat shaky, came over his face.

 

"N... Nothing's wrong, promise," he said. "I just couldn't sleep." There was a beat. "I think the pain got too much. I'll have to ask Date-san for more of that medicine..."

 

Surprisingly, he wasn't in that much pain. He just... didn't want to tell Ankh why he really couldn't sleep. Ankh would worry, about the medals, and about him, and a worried Ankh was a cranky Ankh that he didn't really want to deal with. Not only that, but he genuinely didn't want to worry Ankh either, since he felt like Ankh didn't deserve to worry.

 

He placed his other hand over Ankh's, stroking the back of the hand with his thumb. Eiji sighed, barely audible, then stood. At least his dizziness had gone away. "C'mon, let's go back to bed, then. I feel better now."

 

Eiji shut the lights off in the restaurant, not looking over his shoulder, and crossed the threshold back into their room. He climbed back into the bed, real tense, trembling a little worse now, and shut his eyes tight. "Hey... Ankh... Can we," he felt silly for asking, "actually, sleep with the lights on tonight?" His voice was quiet and meek, and his grip on the Greeed had tightened.

 

He looked at Eiji a little suspiciously, but didn’t question him. He looked tired, and Ankh decided that is he was going to bother him about this more, it wouldn’t be tonight.

 

Once they got back upstairs, Ankh had started to settle down again, but at Eiji's words and the tightened grip on his arm, he stopped. "Alright," he said without hesitation. If it made Eiji feel better for whatever reason, then Ankh didn't mind. He slipped out of the other’s grip, floating over to switch on the lights, then return to the bed. Once back in the bed, he made himself comfortable again. After a moment, Ankh reached out, touching Eiji's cheek lightly.

 

He wasn't really sure what he wanted to say, if he wanted to tell him he loved him, which he had said very rarely so far, if he wanted to tell him not to worry, if he wanted to assure him in some way... Some combination of all of that probably, but Ankh wasn't good at vocalizing things like that.

 

So he stayed silent, watching Eiji carefully. After a long while, he spoke quietly. “Be careful.” Although he wasn’t really sure what he meant. The less filtered version--his first initial thought--had been /Don’t die/, but that had sounded too desperate, too drastic. That would be admitting how much the medals were fazing him.

 

“...I love you,” he added impulsively, because although he had more trouble saying it as openly as Eiji did, Ankh wanted to make sure he knew. He had to make sure he knew.

 

Eiji was immeasurably glad that Ankh didn't ask questions. It would've made things a lot more complicated if Eiji was forced to explain that he felt like someone or something was watching him. So he just sighed with relief, and when Ankh said those words, he smiled, and he felt safe, secure, warm.

 

He pulled Ankh close to him, kissing his palm gently, hands lingering a little longer on the rest of the arm (as if to make sure Ankh was there and not fake) before settling Ankh closer to him, to sleep. "I love you too, Ankh."

 

After that, Eiji fell asleep relatively quickly. He still didn't dream. 

 


	4. Chapter 4

The next morning, Eiji had jolted out of bed after a loud crash came from the kitchen. Images from days past filled his mind, and he stood, panicked, in the middle of the room, breathing heavily and sweating bullets. Chiyoko called out that she was sorry if she woke anyone, she just dropped something, and Eiji glanced over at Ankh. Only then did he calm down.

 

He smiled at the Greeed, warmly. "Good morning, Ankh." Now that the sunlight poured in through the window, he could shut the light off, which he did. Sweat still clung to him—apparently, he had worked up a considerable cold sweat over night. He peeled all of his clothes off, turning his back to Ankh while he clothed himself in a fresh outfit.

 

Before he put on his shirt, he noticed the bandages still wound around his stomach. "Oh," he said, rather stupidly. He wasn't in any pain today, and were the awful feeling gone, he would've felt great. Curiously, he unwrapped the bandages, and the more he saw of skin underneath, the faster he moved.

 

"Ankh," he breathed, turning around to show him, pointing accusingly at his stomach, where the wound used to be—only a large scar with reddened edges remained. "What... Why?" Eiji couldn't quite process words or thoughts, letting the used bandages fall to the floor.

 

The Greeed woke with both the noise and Eiji’s sudden movement, grumbling loudly. He just stayed tangled up in blankets for a moment, not bothering get up yet. He mumbled a slightly disgruntled “Morning” in return. He’d slept a little better for the second half of the night, but that didn’t mean he liked being woken so abruptly.

 

So he sulked a little, until Eiji spoke again. “What?” Looking up at the subject of confusion, Ankh rose from the bed suddenly. How was that possible? The last time Ankh had seen the wound, it had still been pretty bad, and yesterday’s fight had only seemed to worsen Eiji’s state, and yet…

 

Floating over to inspect the scar more closely, he felt that it should’ve been a glad sight, but it only made him uneasy to see. Had those medals done this? It was the only possibility Ankh could think of, but there was no precedent for anything like that. Then again, there was no precedent for any of this.

 

"That... how?" He paused, tone frustrated. After a moment's thought, Ankh had an idea. "Are you still in pain?" If he could possess Eiji, maybe it would allow him to do something about the medals. If he could just get in there, he could probably force them out, right?

 

"We need to get those things out. If you really are feeling better... I can possess you, and force them out."

 

Ankh didn't know either. This... this thought really worried him. Ankh was a Greeed. He was supposed to know this Greeed stuff---medals were from Greeed, and those medals were the cause of this. They had to be. But Ankh didn't know. He didn't know about the medals in the first place, and coupled with the lingering feeling that someone was watching him, it... it scared Eiji.

 

Eiji was not easily scared.

 

He shook his head at the question. "No. I'm not in any pain," he answered, uneasily. He ran a finger over the scar, surprised that it wasn't even tender to the touch. Even though yesterday it looked fresh, today--it looked like it'd been three months. The wound had healed in its entirety, really, closed up and all.

 

At the thought of possession, something changed inside him. The ominous feeling grew, and he froze for a good moment, before snapping out of it and lowering his hand from the scar, finally.

 

"That's... Yeah, that's a good idea," he managed to say, blinking his eyes a few times. He looked down at the floor, bandages around his feet, before looking back up at Ankh and holding out his right arm. "I'm ready."

 

He knew Ankh would help---save him. He knew it.

 

Ankh felt hesitant to possess Eiji again. He remembered the horrible blur of pain that was the last attempt, but he tried to assure himself that it would be fine now. Eiji had been very adamant about not allowing any possessions due to the wound and the pain. If he was allowing this now, it meant that he felt it safe enough to let Ankh do it.

 

He floated over to sink down onto Eiji’s right arm, and immediately, he felt that something was wrong. There was the familiarity of Eiji’s presence, of course, and his own mind. But there was also something else there. Something pushing back against him. Something that didn’t want him there.

 

It was uncomfortable, feeling something in this shared space besides him and Eiji, like any privacy they had was gone.

 

The pressing feeling of those medals was worse here, leading Ankh to wonder if it had been worse for Eiji than he’d thought. The crowding hollowness pushed, and he was tempted to let it force him out, the feeling was so unpleasant. It made goosebumps raise on Eiji’s arms, a shiver running up his spine at the collision of the two forces. But Ankh couldn’t give up so soon, he had to be the one to exert /his/ will over /them/.

 

« Eiji, how do you feel? » Ankh asked as he experimentally pushed back against the foreign presence he could only assume was the other medals, trying to fill the space they occupied with his own consciousness. Besides checking on the man himself, Ankh wanted to see if their connection was affected any by the third party.

 

The possession went easily, unlike the last time. His own consciousness had been pushed back, and no pain had taken over him. He did, however, still feel terrified--especially since now he could feel that emptiness with much more intensity. It scared him. Horribly.

 

But he could still feel Ankh, despite the emptiness in between him and Eiji. He held onto that. He clung onto that. When Ankh started talking, he clung even harder, shoving the emptiness away. He focused on Ankh's voice.

 

« I... I'm fine, » he replied, moving towards the metaphorical area where Ankh was. « I think. »

 

He could feel another presence in there, though, among the emptiness, now that he was inside of himself. It was looming, a kingly presence, though it stayed quiet. He couldn't reach out and touch it, couldn't pinpoint where this second presence.

 

« Ankh, someone else is -- »

 

« Long time no see, Ankh. » The presence finally spoke, and Eiji shrunk. It really was a kingly presence, so overbearing that it was hurting him, giving him a figurative headache. He hated it. He was scared of it. He wanted it /out/ out out.

 

« Ankh, » Eiji begged, though his voice was weak.

 

At Eiji’s response, Ankh calmed a little. It helped to know that he could hear Eiji, and that he hadn’t been swallowed up by the pervading emptiness. But he could feel Eiji’s fear, too, and that compelled Ankh to try and draw closer to him.

 

The voice, however, made Ankh recoil, drawing back from the presence as though it had burned him. He had to get out of here. He couldn’t be in here, so vulnerable in this state, not around /him/. Ankh almost detached himself then and there, almost tried to escape blindly. But Eiji spoke, stopping him in his tracks. Eiji needed him. He couldn’t just leave him here by himself, or rather, with /him/.

 

But Ankh wanted to be selfish. He wanted to turn around and run, and keep running until he couldn’t anymore and the voice speaking to him was far, far, far away.

 

« You’re dead. » That was all he could think to say. He wanted to tell him to get out, not to touch Eiji, place every manner of curse on him. But the words died before Ankh could get them out, swallowed by fear. As much as he loathed to admit it, Ankh was afraid of the man called the King.

 

A creeping fear froze him in place. He was going to take everything from Ankh, as he always had. He would try to take Eiji from him, take his human body from him. This filled him with fear, but thinking about it, Ankh also felt a white-hot rage bubble up.

 

« ...Get out. Leave him out of this. » He tried to keep a strain of pleading from his voice. He was afraid, but he wouldn’t beg. He refused to beg this man for anything. A pause, and he added then, « He isn’t important. » This wasn’t true, but he couldn’t let /him/ know that. Although Eiji needed him, had said his name, he couldn’t say anything to him. Not yet.

 

The words hit Eiji first. He didn't understand them. Was slow on the uptake, slow on processing them, but he did hear them, and a sort of primal instinct to curl up on himself nearly took over. Then, of course, came the understanding. The understanding of the words, though not of Ankh's intentions.

 

« Not... important? » he repeated quietly, mostly to himself. His presence in the body seemed to shrink, as if he was about to get ready to hide deep within himself. Ankh... thought he wasn't important. That's what Ankh had said. Perhaps... Ankh had meant it a different way, but even if he was just saying that, the words still hurt, still cut him deep.

 

The King, on the other hand, simply laughed. « Do you take me for some kind of fool? Are you trying to make a mockery out of me? You never were good at lying to me, » he taunted, followed up by more laughter until he continued speaking. « Even with the one day I had been introduced... I can tell he's very important to you, Ankh. »

 

« Ankh, who is he? » Eiji raised his voice, trying to keep the King's voice from drowning out his own. Too much stuff was happening too often and too quickly, and his mind couldn't catch up. He did seem to know Ankh from before, coupled with the fact he has medals... He has to be a Greeed right?

 

« Don't worry, boy, » the voice answered, pompously, « as this little birdy can't live without me. I'm surprised you didn't recognize me first off the bat... Then again, I am a little different. »

 

And it was true. Not only was he made of medals now, but the desire that had once been so prominent, so strong, had fizzled out (similar to Eiji) and become nothing but a void. He wanted destruction, to destroy all desire in the world. He wanted to make sure no one was happy.

 

Starting with Ankh.

 

« Now, get out! » the King pressed at the edges of the barrier, forcefully ejecting Ankh from the possession. Luckily, Eiji had managed to get in control at first, and he looked sheepishly down and away. He bit his lip as her thought about it.

 

His bluff had been called. He almost tried to carry on with it, to insist that Eiji was a tool, important in that Ankh could use him to carry through his own agendas. But formulating the lie, he couldn't bring himself to say it.

 

« Funny, then, how ever since I started living without you I've been /much/ happier. » He spat, feeling his anger override his fear. « So happy, I didn't bother to tell him about any back­stabbing, pompous /ghosts/. »

 

When he was ejected, a part of Ankh welcomed it. The oppressive presence didn't quite reach outside of Eiji's body, just a dull, distant ache to him now. The arm was trembling as he dug his talons into the bedpost near him, tearing a deep gouge in the wood in his frustration.

 

"Why is he /here/?" He hissed, more to himself than to Eiji. He seemed to be entirely too wrapped up in his own distress to pay attention to Eiji for the moment.

 

Everything had been... well, perfect. As perfect as things could go for Ankh in his current state. He had Eiji, a way to experience the world like a human, and although he didn't have his body, or all of his medals, those two things had made life feel so exhilarating, so full of possibility. An entirely foreign perception up until now.

 

But now /he/ was here, and he wanted to take all that away from Ankh. Abruptly turning his attention to Eiji, Ankh flew over, grasping his face between trembling fingers. "Don't--­­ Don't let him take you over," he said, and now it sounded like he was begging.

 

"/You/, King, if you can hear me, get the /hell/ out of him! You decided to come back and ruin me? Fine, just don't try to do it in such a cowardly way!"

 

« Oh, » Eiji had said, realizing who the presence was finally. Ankh's words clued him in, the words about the ghost, about the back stabbing. Ankh had brought up the King once before, when Date had forced him to talk about the Greeed in exchange for dearly needed cell medals.

 

Ankh was ejected, and Eiji felt entirely too empty with him gone. He took a step forward, as soon as he was in control again, almost reaching out with his hand, reaching out for Ankh's presence. His hand fell to his side before it got very far.

 

Eiji didn't move when Ankh grabbed his face, entirely too used to such an occurrence. He noted how... scared Ankh sounded, and he weakly nodded his head (as much as he could being held in place like this).

 

"I won't, Ankh," he promised, peeling the Greeed's talons from his cheeks. He smiled reassuringly. "I'm stronger than him." He really didn't know how strong the King was, but he wasn't gonna give up. He couldn't give up, if only for Ankh.

 

"He's... I dunno, he's not responding." It was weird, he thought. He was so hostile before. But now he was silent. He shook his head, sighing as he scratched the back of it.

 

Ankh caught Eiji’s hand as he went to peel away his talons, holding it so tightly that his nails pressed painfully into Eiji’s skin. He still trembled a little, but was beginning to gather himself. A little bit. He wanted to believe that Eiji was stronger, but another part of him was doubtful. He had told Ankh that he wouldn’t leave him behind. He had promised him. It unnerved Ankh a little bit how much he clung to that, how much the idea of losing Eiji scared him. He had never planned to get this close when he’d given him that belt, to let himself become so attached. So weak.

 

“Good,” he muttered, loosening his grip a little and trying to clear his mind. He had to think more rationally about this. But how could he think rationally when he was so in the darkness on the threat they faced?

 

Hearing voices a little ways outside the door, Ankh let go of Eiji’s hand finally. It sounded like Hina and Shingo had arrived, from what he could tell. Having a more solid body right now would ease this sense of helplessness, he thought. “Hold on.”

 

He left the room, taking care to shut the door behind him. After quickly possessing Shingo before there could be any protest and a brief explanation (rather, lie) that Eiji was still asleep, and it would be best to leave him alone for now, he returned to the back room. He didn’t look at Eiji for a moment as he stepped back in and closed the door, instead staring at the ground. His mind still reeled.

 

“I won’t… let him hurt you,” he said, voice low. He itched to break something, or punch something, take the tenseness that had transferred into the detective’s body out on something. “It’s just a bunch of medals. We’ll be able to get them out easily.” He’d said it all before, but repeating those words almost helped him convince himself that they were true. On the more pressing subject... Well, Ankh wasn’t sure how to even begin to bring up the King.

 

He sighed when Ankh left to talk (read: possess) Shingo. Eiji really did miss Ankh's possessions. Ankh had always taken care to treat his body well, and he enjoyed the...closeness the possessions had provided. Even before they had, well, confessed, deep in his heart, Eiji loved how Ankh and he could talk like that without anyone knowing.

 

And now, it was gone, if the King kept shoving Ankh out. He wondered how long Shingo's body would last. Probably not long, if Eiji had to guess, if Ankh was going to force him to use it every day. Normally, Shingo would only be used once in awhile, like during certain fights, or the like. But, he was still upset that Ankh wouldn't possess him for awhile.

 

Ankh returned to the room, and Eiji nodded. "Yeah. I trust you, Ankh," he said, with a smile that was probably more for himself than for Ankh. When Ankh had last possessed him, he couldn't get the medals out because he was too shocked, right? Right. Not because he couldn't. He trusted Ankh to be able to get them out.

 

Crossing the room, Eiji took Ankh's Greeed hand, lacing his fingers with Ankh's own. He leaned forward, pressing his forehead against Ankh's. (Although it still felt a little weird, at least, he could see how human Ankh really was with the detective's eyes and mouth and everything else, so he tried to get close. (He also figured it'd be fun for Ankh to experience these sorts of things for the first time. So, of course, he paused to pluck him on the lips, chaste, as he squeezed the hand.))

 

"I, um... wonder how we'll explain this to Hina." He motioned to his bare chest, which was the point that he realized he still hadn't put on any clothes further than his underwear, and let go of Ankh's hand, hurrying over to the dresser, where his clothes he had picked, sat on top, with an odd tinge of red upon his cheeks.

 

It was odd to hear those words. Trust wasn’t something that Ankh had any experience with either. He didn’t trust others, and never expected anyone to trust him in turn. He felt a little unsure, hearing this from Eiji. He kept saying that he’d force out the medals, but did he really believe it himself? The King was strong, and Ankh was still so weak, in more ways than one.

 

He forced himself to relax at the familiar contact, looking at Eiji finally. It wouldn’t help Eiji’s peace of mind any to see Ankh unsure about this. But he tensed again when their foreheads touched, although it was for a less serious reason this time. The kiss caught him off-guard, and he jolted, looking like a deer caught in headlights. He’d never been kissed like that before. Sure, Eiji kissed his hand often, but it felt different like this. It was strange. But… also nice. He flushed, dropping his gaze from Eiji.

 

It took him a moment to process Eiji’s words. “...Oh. Right. We’ll think of something,” he mumbled vaguely after a moment. “It may just cause even more trouble to tell the others.” He was still operating under the hope (delusion, more like) that they could take care of the problem quickly and easily.

 

“Those medals are strong, but I don’t think we should use them if we don’t have to. It might make things worse,” he started slowly, thinking aloud. “If they bother you too much… if /he/ bothers you… tell me. I can try again,” he gestured with his Greeed arm, “to possess you, I mean.”

 

He didn’t like the idea of feeling that awful emptiness again, or being in such close proximity to the King, but he hated the thought of Eiji being in pain even more.

 

Eiji threw on his shirt and pants rather quickly, nodding at Ankh's idea. "Yeah... I can... act hurt, or something, yeah! That way she won't worry." It was such a shame he was a terrible actor. And that he didn't know he was a terrible actor.

 

He just finished pulling his pants up when Ankh had started speaking once more. He listened, and he stayed quiet, thinking for a very long time. He turned to Ankh and nodded. "Thank you, Ankh. But..." His gaze dropped briefly, before meeting Ankh directly in the eyes once more, confidently. "I don't think they'll bother me. Just... start thinking of ways to get them out. And him. I'm sure you can think of something."

 

He closed the distance between him and Ankh, reached down to squeeze his hand without breaking eye contact, and smiled reassuringly. "Okay?" A pause, then he whispered, as if someone was listening in, "I love you, Ankh. ... Let's go eat breakfast."

 

He pushed passed Ankh and into the restaurant area, down into the kitchen and main dining area. Chiyoko and Hina were both busy setting up for today's theme, which Eiji didn't really like the looks of. He scratched at his cheek, laughing a bit, before heading into the kitchen to snag some leftovers. He pulled out a popsicle for Ankh, unwrapping it and handing it to him.

 

Ankh was a little doubtful as to how well Eiji would be able to convince anyone that he was still hurt, but he didn’t quite have the heart to tell him this. He nodded, squeezing Eiji’s hand back when they had locked hands again. He felt the usual warmth at the sound of those words, and found himself calming a little more. He didn’t need to worry about this, he’d figure it out. Eiji trusted him to, and for the first time in a very, very long time, he didn’t want to betray that trust, no matter what.

 

He followed Eiji to the kitchen, ignoring the goings on in the dining area. It was near impossible to get him interested in the restaurant events and themes, Ankh preferring to keep to himself. He accepted the popsicle gladly, and began to eat it, leaning against one of the tables as he waited for Eiji to get his own food.

 

He didn’t sense any Yummies so far, so besides the issue with the purple medals, it seemed to be shaping up to be a fairly uninteresting day. Although if it was a day spent with Eiji, at least, Ankh didn’t consider it entirely uninteresting.

 

Watching Eiji brightly, Ankh thought for a moment. “I don’t think you’ll have to fight today, unless Kazari decides to ruin our day unexpectedly.” Which really, wasn’t something he’d put past him. But Ankh thought that considering the circumstances, a little optimism was more appropriate.

 

“And if you really are feeling better…” He paused doubtfully, because he still wasn’t entirely convinced himself. “You don’t have to stay in bed resting, I suppose. You could do whatever you like, then.” He made this small talk, trying to regain a sense of normalcy after the events of earlier.

 

"Wasn't Kazari hurt bad though? At least... Enough for him to run away, I guess," Eiji observed. He didn't really remember much of the fight, between the pain and the possession. He wondered idly if it was the King who had possessed him, when he fought that time. He couldn't remember. He couldn't remember.

 

Pulling himself out of the reverie, he took some snacks, some leftovers apparently, from the fridge. Whatever it was, he mixed it up with a pair of chopsticks to break it up and shovel a few bites into his mouth. He felt so empty, so hungry, so he ate quick as Ankh spoke. He finished about half of the bowl before he swallowed, leaning against the table next to Ankh and lowering the bowl.

 

He thought, pensive, for a moment or two, then keeping his gaze downcast, he spoke: "Maybe we could go out." A beat. "L-Like, patrol the city," he quickly added, with a tinge of embarrassment to his voice. "Stuff like that."

 

Eiji really just wanted to distract his mind. It had been slow at Cous Coussier, all this week, too, so he wouldn't need to help out. Chiyoko and Hina wouldn't let him do heavy work, even if he did work, anyway. He figured Ankh would enjoy going out, anyway, if only for the same reasons Eiji wanted to.

 

He raised his eyes to look at Ankh, smiling gently. "I'm sure if, like... We tell Hina-chan that we're just going to the, um," he lowered his gaze again, his cheeks light pink, "movies, or to the park, or zoo, she wouldn't mind. She probably would worry if I told her we were going to patrol the city. We can patrol the zoo. Yeah. Or whatever other place. Human outings, you know."

 

Eiji quickly shoved more food into his mouth so that he could stop talking with his foot in his mouth.

 

As Ankh finished his popsicle, he glanced at Eiji, raising an eyebrow. “A patrol couldn’t hurt,” he conceded, shrugging. What Eiji was really asking him flew entirely over his head. He did find himself confused, though, seeing Eiji blushing as he suggested such a mundane thing. Were the medals affecting him or something? It was the only thing he could think of that might make Eiji behave oddly.

 

The movies? The park? The zoo? Those seemed like counter-productive places to patrol for the most part. He stared at Eiji now, baffled. “How would we patrol for Yummies at a movie?” He pointed out. “I’d say the park or the zoo would be the best place to patrol.” Really, Eiji could be a little thick sometimes. Of course, Ankh himself didn’t realize that /he/ was the one being thick at the moment.

 

But he too thought that it would be nice to have a distraction. With the amount of stress as of late, it was hard not to feel on edge constantly. Tossing away the now bare popsicle stick, Ankh pushed off from the table to stand up straight, turning to look at Eiji expectantly.

 

“Alright, then. We’ll do that.” He paused, thoughtful. “Kazari may be either too badly hurt or scared off by those medals, so we probably won’t need to patrol for too long.”

 

The Greeed looked lost in thought for a moment, now thinking about backup plans in case they /did/ run into something. It would probably be best to keep Eiji from fighting if it could be helped, the thought of that combo possessing him again was a bothersome one. He still hadn’t caught on to what Eiji had meant by ‘patrol’.

 

Eiji choked on his food when Ankh asked him that question. He... really didn't think that excuse through. Coughing and swallowing, he shook his head, still not raising his eyes. At least Ankh didn't catch onto the social implications of it, even with his slip up. He'd probably have died right then and there if Ankh did.

 

His face burned as he nodded, shoveling the rest of the food into his mouth. "I have the perfect place! ... To patrol, I mean," he said, adding it quickly. He rinsed out the bowl and left it in the sink, grabbing Ankh by the hand. He let go promptly when he left, though.

 

He met Hina in the dining area, hoisting some decorations up. He tried to explain (quietly) that he and Ankh were gonna go out and patrol the city, and when she objected to him going out because he fought yesterday, he promised her that he'd be alright (he leaned in and whispered, too, so Ankh couldn't hear, that Ankh deserves to do some human stuff too). She agreed.

 

Eiji returned to Ankh, grinning, the heat from his cheeks gone. "Okay, Ankh. Let's go." And he motioned for the other to follow him out the door. He hoped that Ankh let them "patrol" long enough for this date to work.

 

Ankh watched Eiji as he moved around the restuarant, eyes narrowed. He certainly was acting oddly. But it was a familiar kind of odd, with Eiji grinning stupidly and saying baffling things and the like. A normal kind of odd. No hollowness or uncharacteristic actions, no visible signs of pain or anything like that. And right now, Ankh practically welcomed any kind of normalcy, even if it was confusing to him.

 

A slight nod, and he followed him from the restaurant. He looked around as they stepped out of Cous Coussier, already thinking of places they could patrol around the city before remembering that Eiji had mentioned that he already had an idea. “So, where are we going?” He asked, raising an eyebrow. Ankh often liked to pick out where they patrolled, but he didn’t have any objections to any ideas Eiji had. Despite his idiocy at times, the man was much smarter than he let on.

 

Even if patrolling probably wasn’t the most ideal option right now, it was better than sitting around getting bogged down, just thinking about their problems. He was glad that they’d both get a distraction from this. He glanced over at Eiji, gaze softening. Ankh wasn’t too open with his feelings outside of when it was just the two of them, but he sometimes didn’t quite catch himself before he looked at Eiji a little too warmly, or reached out to brush his hand, small but telling gestures.

 

“...If we run into anything, we should avoid fighting if possible… If it can’t be avoided, then maybe no combos.” Saying this, he trailed off, seeming to be talking more to himself than to the other. Although Eiji seemed to be healed, Ankh wasn’t going to take unnecessary risks so soon. He mulled over these thoughts, glad to be able to distract himself with something like this.

 

"You'll see when we get there," Eiji replied cryptically. He really did want to keep it a surprise, but if he kept the surprise too long, he was sure that Ankh really wouldn't pick up on the whole date thing... He grinned at him before starting to walk. "Yeah, yeah, got it!" he said idly to Ankh saying they should avoid fighting. He didn't notice the way Ankh had looked at him -- but if he had, he would've surely blushed.

 

He seemed a little too chipper, a little too peppy. Maybe this was all getting to his head, but he just... he really wanted to spend a little more time with Ankh. He was scared, still, and although he figured from the beginning, when he first put OOOs on, he had a metaphorical clock over his head, he felt that it was ticking down twice as fast now.

 

He wanted Ankh to experience human things, too. Ankh seemed human enough. To Eiji, Ankh /was/ human already. He loved every bit of him.

 

Eiji only came to stop in front of an ice cream parlor, seemingly upscale. The sign out front advertised that they carried tons of flavors and other things. Eiji looked over at Ankh and, doing jazz hands, said, "Ta-daa!"

 

He walked inside, waiting for Ankh to catch up. He probably would need to help Ankh decide or something...

 

He’d see when they got there? That was cryptic. Were it anyone else, Ankh would refuse to walk into what could be a possible trap, but since it was Eiji, he just gave an irritated huff and continued to follow him.

 

When they reached their destination, Ankh slowed, almost having walked past it. An ice cream parlor? How were they going to patrol at an ice cream parlor? He gave Eiji a baffled look, and then, when he walked in, snapped “Hey, Eiji!” after him.

 

What were they doing here? Ankh may have counted himself the less oblivious of the two, but he was completely in the dark here.

 

He followed Eiji in, looking around. Once he'd caught up, he grabbed Eiji's shoulder to give it a demanding shake. "Why are we here?" He questioned. Since experiencing taste, he was never one to turn down food, especially ice cream, but he was still thoroughly confused. Dates weren't exactly common among Greeed.

 

Furrowing his brow, Ankh looked from Eiji to the restaurant around them. Mostly, they just bought ice from the store and threw it in the fridge, or went to a vendor on the street. He'd never really been to any place like this. The Greeed's gaze locked onto the ice cream behind the glass counter, looking rather like a hawk ready to dive in on unsuspecting prey.

 

Ankh really was in the dark. Perhaps he could tell him now... He pulled Ankh's hand from his shoulder, smiling a little awkwardly, looking down for a minute. He squeezed the Greeed's hand and, suddenly, bowed lowly.

 

"I'm sorry for lying," he muttered. "I just..." Eiji straightened himself and let go of his hand, wringing both of his behind himself. "I wanted to spend time with you in general. Like, um..." He broke eye contact with Ankh, and his voice dropped inexplicably low.

 

"Like... You know... When people go on dates... And I figured this would interest you a lot. I just want you to experience things like humans do."

 

His cheeks were tinted pink when he looked back up, and to change the subject rather quickly, he dragged Ankh over to the counter, pointing out the various flavors one by one.

 

"You can also get toppings and all of that..." He motioned to the various ingredients. "Oh, you've never had this kind, have you? It's different from what you normally eat. But I like it better, personally."

 

His cheeks were still pink as he realized he'd still been holding onto Ankh's hand, and he dropped it, focusing on the ice cream.

 

A date? It was a concept Ankh knew of vaguely, but as he'd never expected it to matter, so he hadn't spent too much time learning anything about it. It was something humans did, with people that they liked.

 

Blinking, he looked down at their hands. "Oh," was all he found himself saying. "I... I see." He wasn't sure what to say to Eiji's other words, about experiencing the world like a human. He was touched.

 

That... wasn't a bad idea at all. The two often spent time around each other anyways, but in this context, it was different. The focus wasn't on the stress of battle or getting medals, but just simply being with Eiji. And any time spent with Eiji was time that was important to Ankh.

 

So, since this apparent date involved two of his favorite things, he didn't raise any complaint.

 

He allowed himself to be dragged over to the counter, listening to Eiji explain how it all worked to him. The Greeed looked overwhelmed by the amount of possibilities, to say the least. He briefly thought that he'd just ask for everything, but he figured that Eiji would call that 'unreasonable'.

 

He has to admit he was a little disappointed when Eiji let go of his hand, but he wasn't going to say that, of course. Ankh glanced at the different flavors, then at Eiji, thoughtful. "What... kind do you like?"

 

Ankh wasn't reacting badly, and that was good. He seemed to understand at least some of the connotations of the word "date", too, which was also really good. It still made Eiji somewhat embarrassed though, that he had to state it outright.

 

But Ankh would learn. He always learned and adapted rather quickly, and that was something that Eiji admired about him.

 

Eiji thought for a moment, looking over at all the flavors another time. "Um, well... I like the..." He pointed at one, all the way in the back. "... the chocolate chip cookie dough one. It tastes like... cookie dough. There are small pieces of it." He cracked a goofy smile at that, looking back over at Ankh.

 

"They have some of the same popsicle flavors here, too, like banana and strawberry. Those are the ones you eat the most, aren't they?" He really wasn't sure what flavors Ankh actually liked the most. He did just notice he always ate yellow and red ones.

 

"While you decide, I'll order mine, okay?" he said, leaving Ankh's side to go to the front of the area, where he got a somewhat large cone with the ice cream he had mentioned before, topped with sprinkles and melted chocolate.

 

Ankh gave a shrug. "I guess," he muttered in response to Eiji's question. He didn't really prefer any flavor over the other, as he counted himself lucky just being able to taste anything.

 

He took a few moments longer to choose, still having trouble deciding. The flavor Eiji had mentioned sounded... alright, but not especially interesting. If anything, it was just a nice thing to know, he guessed. Just in case he needed to know for... some reason.

 

After a while longer, he finally picked a flavor, joining Eiji to get a couple bright orange tangerine scoops in a cone. He eyed it a little bit suspiciously, but gave the ice cream a taste after a moment.

 

"...Not bad," Ankh conceded. He liked it, although it could have partly been the similarity of the flavor to the popsicles he usually ate.

 

Glancing at Eiji, Ankh paused, looking a little awkward. He didn't really like seeming clueless, but he was finding himself lost. "So... Is this all humans do on dates?"

 

Eiji grinned as Ankh /finally/ picked out a flavor. He wanted to spend time with him, not have Ankh spend time with deciding what ice cream to eat. Eiji got even more excited when Ankh liked it, and he clapped his hands together (careful not to spill his own cone).

 

"No toppings?" he said, though he was mostly joking, and he ended it with a little laugh. He led Ankh back outside, to one of the benches in front of the parlor, where he sat down, dragging Ankh to sit down too.

 

He still remembered Ankh's question, and he was still thinking about it. He took another moment to decide, chewing on some of the chunks in his ice cream before shaking his head. "Well... No, I don't think." He rubbed the back of his head, looking away. "I haven't been on a date before, either... But I'll try to make it authentic for you!"

 

Eiji wouldn't stop here, either. He would take Ankh out on as many more dates as possible. Even if Ankh complained, Eiji would continue, dragging Ankh everywhere. He wanted Ankh to feel loved, even when Eiji was gone--

 

He shook his head. Don't think about that at this time. There was nothing set in stone, either, so he still had a chance.

 

"But, dates are a way to get closer. People usually go to dinner and movies and stuff like that. But those are cliché ones, I think. I thought you'd like this better." He also wasn't sure how Ankh would act sitting in a dark theater for two hours. He paused, then, and his cheeks blushed lightly, and he leaned over, closer to Ankh. "They... also do this."

 

And Eiji kissed Ankh on the lips. It was longer than the first kiss they shared, though still rather short. He pulled away, looking down and resuming eating his ice cream in silence.

 

"I'm not a /glutton/," Ankh muttered defensively. Choosing a topping would've taken twice as long, anyways, a much more complicated and delicate decision. He had been sorely tempted to take that time, but he didn't think Eiji would have appreciated it.

 

Sitting down on the bench, he ate his ice cream as he listened to Eiji explain dates further. So, they were both new to this as well. That was comforting, that Eiji didn't really know what to expect either. Ankh was glad that Eiji had decided against the other options he'd listed, they sounded much less interesting than this.

 

He was contemplating his ice cream thoughtfully when Eiji's words prompted him to look up, and he found himself being kissed for the second time that day. He jolted away this time, not expecting Eiji to do something like that outside of the privacy of their room. He wasn’t sure how big a gesture that was to humans, but it certainly felt like something exceedingly tender, and so something Ankh wasn’t quite sure how to react to without being /too/ open.

 

Blinking, he stared at Eiji, even after the other man looked away. He realized, then, that his reaction probably could have been taken badly. Drawing in a deep breath, Ankh’s gaze moved back to his ice cream as he thought, eating a little more of it. Then, he looked at Eiji again, hesitating for a moment before he leaned over, quickly and awkwardly planting a kiss on Eiji’s cheek. He drew back hastily, suddenly becoming very interested in his ice cream as he looked away.

 

He was silent for a moment, but then spoke, drawing himself up and attempting to sound nonchalant. “These… ‘dates’ sound… intriguing, I guess.” Ankh paused, not taking his gaze off his food. “I don’t mind doing it. I… think I might like it. So long as it’s with you.” He spoke with a forcedly casual tone.

 

Being with Eiji like this made him feel different, like something more than a whirlpool of desire, or a couple of cold, lifeless medals. The way the man spoke to him, treated him, the way he made Ankh feel… Ankh felt like he was alive when he was with Eiji.

 

So as long as he could be with him, Ankh thought that probably, he could find some way to be happy wherever he was dragged to.

 

To be quite honest, Eiji wasn't expecting Ankh to return the kiss with another one. He did expect Ankh to pull away or seem shocked, which he had, as expected. But, it was Eiji's turn to be shocked when lips pressed against his cheek. He hadn't been looking over or anything at him, didn't see him out of the corner of his eyes, but he felt the wetness of the lips and he drew away a little.

 

He was glad that the kiss didn't last more than a few seconds, for his cheeks heated up with such an intensity that he was sure he'd pass out with all the blood rushing to his head. In fact, he held his head with the hand he held his cone in, careful not to drop the ice cream (though that was the least of his worries), and gripped the edge of he bench with his free one.

 

Eiji held his breath as Ankh spoke even more after the short silence. The blush on his face had turned into a full flush, and he huffed a few moments after Ankh had finished speaking. He shoved as much ice cream into his mouth as he could (choking briefly before it melted and he swallowed it), then turned to Ankh. He grabbed his hand, scooted closer to him, so that their shoulders were touching.

 

"Ankh... We can go on as many dates as you want. I'll always be here for you."

 

The last line had been added quickly, rushed, and Eiji didn't know if he could believe it himself. But if he said it enough, he could pretend. The medals rustled around inside him, but he was strong, especially with Ankh at his side. He wouldn't let Ankh get hurt. He didn't want to see a face like that one he had made when he begged Eiji not to give into the King ever again. So he wouldn't, if it meant not having to see that.

 

"I promise." And then, lower, embarrassed, "I love you."

 

He squeezed Ankh's hand tight, lacing their fingers together.

 

Ankh didn’t react at first when Eiji moved closer, taking his hand. /”I’ll always be here for you.”/ But he wouldn’t. Ankh knew that. He kept his gaze on his ice cream, tense. If it wasn’t the King and those medals, it could be one bad fight, or any unforeseen mishap, or-- Well, any matter of things could snuff out something so fragile as a human life. It was scary.

 

Ankh gripped Eiji’s hand very tightly with the promise, almost as though if he didn’t keep hold of him, Eiji would disappear right then and there. Those kinds of thoughts made part of him think that he should distance himself, not let himself get so entangled in messy emotions and things that would only weaken him.

 

But the thoughts also just made him more determined to hold onto Eiji, and make sure that nothing would prevent him from keeping that promise to Ankh, and that was the wish that won over the other. It was a useless thing to think. Ankh wasn’t strong enough to be sure that he could do any of that. He was stubborn, but he wasn’t stupid.

 

And yet, Ankh found himself thinking a lot of stupid, useless thoughts around Eiji. And he didn’t really mind it. He leaned into Eiji a little, squeezing his hand.

 

“Good,” he murmured, then fell silent. He’d almost forgotten the ice cream until it began to drip down the cone and over his hand, and Ankh sat up a little with a hiss of irritation. He still didn’t let go of Eiji’s hand (although he did loosen his grip) as he started to finish the ice cream, albeit very distractedly.

 

“...I’m here for you, too,” he said slowly, after a moment. He wouldn’t run away for the sake of saving his own skin, or distance himself to prevent any pain. No matter how much his mind urged him to, he didn’t think he could leave Eiji like that if he tried.

 

Eiji reveled in the heat that Ankh gave off. It was a certain type of heat, and he loved it---one that couldn't be recreated by any sort of machine or fire otherwise. He likened it to how Ankh probably felt about him. Maybe that's why, ever since that time where they first said those words, Ankh had gotten warmer over all.

 

He made a low noise in his throat when Ankh confirmed he'd be there too. That's what he wanted to hear. That's all he wanted. He felt like he could move a mountain if Ankh was there at his side. He could travel the world with only tomorrow's pants and never talk to anyone again, if Ankh was there.

 

Eiji couldn't help himself. Keeping their hands interlocked, he pulled the Greeed---no, the other man, closer, pulling Ankh's hand into his own lap. The hand that held the cone shifted said cone before grabbing onto Ankh's other wrist. He gently pulled away the ice cream Ankh was eating, and instead, snuck his head near Ankh's instead.

 

Not really thinking if Shingo was watching or not (he'd have to apologize later, if it wasn't too awkward), he shut his eyes quick and kissed Ankh again, head tilted. This kiss, so far, lasted the longest, used the most force, but also the most... love. It felt cheesy thinking that, but Eiji really wasn't thinking anyway.

 

After a few minutes, he regained his senses and pulled his lips away, still holding onto Ankh, not really moving far---just a few inches away. He smiled warm, a goofy smile, as if he hadn't just kissed him.

 

"Ankh, you've really become human." A pause. "No... You were human from the start, weren't you?"

 

Ankh really was going to have to start getting used to kisses, apparently. He didn’t mind the thought of getting used to them, though. So he leaned into the kiss this time, hesitant and feeling rather clumsy.  
  
He found himself blushing when Eiji pulled away, although his look of surprise wasn’t quite as prominent as it had been previously. He still glanced away, though, fixing his gaze on one of their interlocked hands. It didn’t help his red face any, but looking at Eiji would probably be too much, he thought.  
  
When Eiji spoke again, Ankh looked back at him, frowning a little. “Not… from the start,” he muttered. “But…” He hesitated, looking at their hands again. Ankh right hand was human. It was something he normally did in public, just to keep humans from being bothered. He certainly didn’t think he was a human. But this feeling of warmth that spread through him was definitely new. If feeling things like this was something only humans felt, if he could see and experience the world the way humans did… Then maybe, Eiji was right.  
  
But that wasn’t quite as important to him right now as another question the words brought up. Eiji had never seen Ankh’s true form, and it was easy to forget that he had had another face besides this one, with his current situation. Ankh looked at Eiji, gaze uncertain, a little suspicious. “Would it matter to you if I wasn’t?”   
  
Eiji always treated the arm the same as when he was attached to the detective, so Ankh had reasoned that it didn’t really matter to Eiji. Yet… “I’m not really a human, even if I can act and feel like one. I look like this right now, but I have a body made of medals like all the other Greeed.” He stared at the other man, a little defensive now.

 

The question shocked Eiji. This was the... exact opposite of how Eiji wanted Ankh to feel. To Eiji, Ankh's desire to be human, to desire human things, to taste them and to love, was so blatant, so distinct as the difference between night and day. Ankh wasn't like the other Greeed. He was Ankh.

 

His gaze softened, the shocked edges of his features brushed aside into something sweeter. He smiled, and he shook his head. "It wouldn't matter in the slightest. Ankh is Ankh. And Ankh is the one I love." He felt kind of silly---yeah, he was open about his feelings for the most part, but it still felt a little silly to say them out in public. At least no one was watching.

 

He drew away, slightly, still saying as close as possible to Ankh as he could. Letting go of both of Ankh's hands, he set the half finished (now mostly melted) cone on the opposite side of the bench. He paused a minute, then grabbed Ankh's right arm, holding it close to his chest.

 

Despite Ankh having it disguised as a human arm, he hoped the point would get across. "If you are Greeed, or human, or even neither, something else entirely..." His eyes sparkled, though there was a hint of sadness---if Ankh would ask him about the melancholy that swam in his irises, he wouldn't be able to answer.

 

"If Ankh was made out of a hundred million medals, I would love each and every one of them. But I would still love you. No matter what form you may take."

 

Ankh’s stare went from defensive to surprised as Eiji spoke. He found himself relaxing too, happy with Eiji’s answer. It didn’t matter to him. It didn’t matter to Eiji if he was incomplete, or complete, or a human, or a Greeed… It had been a new worry, but one that had bothered Ankh.

 

Of course, as the man went on, Ankh grew more and more embarrassed. “A-/alright,/” he grumbled, pulling his arm from Eiji’s grasp then. “I get it.” He huffed in irritation, but Ankh felt his heart beat a little faster, his face still very warm.

 

When he had looked at Eiji, he had caught sight of a flicker of… sadness? Ankh looked back at him again, frowning now despite the blush. He set aside his own ice cream without really thinking, reaching out to take Eiji’s hand again and look down at it. “Stop giving me that look,” he muttered, although he didn’t sound that bothered by it, really. “When you look /sad/ like that it feels like you’re... expecting to die or something.”

 

He gave another irritable huff, tightening his grasp on Eiji’s hand. “You’re not going anywhere.” Ankh said this out loud half for his own benefit, as though trying to assure himself of this fact too. He glanced back at Eiji, frowning still. He didn’t want to act like Eiji’s days were numbered, like something terrible was going to happen to him, because nothing was entirely set in stone yet.

 

They didn’t even know half of what was happening. This lack of clarity was unnerving to Ankh, of couse, but in this case… it was also hopeful.

 

Eiji didn't quite understand what Ankh meant. But he nodded, and he squeezed Ankh's hand. "I'm sorry," he said, with regards to the look he was supposedly giving the other. And then, a little quieter, with a lot of love, as he looked down at his their folded hands together, with a light blush on his cheek: "I won't leave. You'll be my partner forever."

 


	5. Chapter 5

Those days were gone.

 

Though Eiji didn't quite realize it, a lot of him had changed. He no longer woke up early, he no longer kissed Ankh (though, sometimes he did, but never when he was the arm, as if he was repulsed by it), he no longer slept well or easy, and he no longer clung to Ankh at night when he did manage to sleep.

 

He felt... empty. He felt so empty that he didn't feel the need to tell Ankh. What was the point? Ankh couldn't do anything anyway... He shook his head at that thought, leaning back on one of the barstools at the restaurant. He didn't want to think that way, but he couldn't help it. Emptiness led to nasty thoughts.

 

He had only felt this way once prior, and that was when he had left Africa.

 

So, Ankh was talking, about something, Eiji hadn't really paid attention at all. He looked just as tired as he felt, and to try and make up for it---or at least get Ankh to /shut up/ (no, why was he thinking like that? stop, Eiji Hino!)---he set his forehead on the counter, hands resting in his lap.

 

The changes didn’t go noticed by any of the others for the most part, but Ankh noticed all too well Eiji’s increasingly odd behaviors. Perhaps because it was mostly his behavior towards Ankh that changed. He had sulked initially when Eiji had begun to ignore him. Eiji would have noticed and apologized, right? But he didn’t.

 

When sulking hadn’t worked, Ankh had turned to less unpleasant methods, instead trying to work around the strangeness. Eiji didn’t seem to care for dates anymore, so he stayed in with him. Eiji didn’t seem to like to be around him as an arm anymore, so he put Shingo’s body under strain trying to be human enough for as long as he could during the day. He had difficulty not snapping, though, because demanding what was wrong and getting angry only ever got an uncharacteristic irritation with Ankh in response.

 

He stood behind Eiji’s shoulder now, attempting to ask the man about maybe taking a break from fighting for a couple days, because he seemed much too tired, and Date and Gotou could pick up his slack easily. But Eiji wasn’t responding, just dropping his forehead onto the counter.

 

Scowling, Ankh grabbed the man’s shoulder with his clawed hand, pulling to try and yank him back up. “Are you even listening to me? Hey, Eiji!” Eiji really did look tired lately. He slept badly, but besides that natural exhaustion, there was a strange, hollow edge to his tiredness.

 

“...Are you sure those medals aren’t acting up? They’ve been too quiet too long… I don’t like it. Hey, are you listening?”

 

Eiji turned his head ever so slightly, eyes narrowing as he looked up at Ankh. His vision seemed duller, now, though he didn't know why---and he didn't really feel like finding out the answer. So, he just looked up at Ankh, and he was much, much more bearable like this, and he was glad that he was like this, as just the /thought/ of Ankh possessing him sent shivers up his spine (stop, why? you used to like it, didn't you?).

 

He clicked his tongue, a low "tsk" escaping his mouth as he stood up, pressing heavily against the counter with his hands. He turned away from Ankh, waving one hand in the air as he haphazardly walked away.

 

"Yeah, yeah, no fighting, tired, something like that," he parroted, rather boredly. "I was listening the whole time. Gotou and Date, picking up the slack, yeah, works for me." Eiji sat down at one of the tables in the corner, on the opposite side of the room, slumping backwards, looking up at the ceiling.

 

"The medals?" Another "tsk". He shrugged. "I don't think they are. I'm just tired, Ankh. Trust me." His eyes still on the ceiling, where Ankh couldn't see, shone with a purple glint, and a small laugh curled over his lips. His whole demeanor seemed to change, lips curling up into a smile. He leaned further back, still with a purple glint.

 

"Don't you trust me, Ankh? I would tell you /anything/ if I thought something was wrong. I love you, after all, huh!" Eiji's features switched to a grimace, the purple glint left, and he snapped the chair forward with a thud, shaking his head. He leaned his head against the table now, his back to Ankh.

 

Ankh watched him with a scowl that hid a great amount of concern. “Alright. Then we’ll do that.” He paused. Eiji was reckless sometimes, doing stupid things for the sake of saving strangers... “Maybe I should take back the medals you have, then, just so you can have a rest without worrying about transforming.” He held the rest of the medals anyways, but Eiji had the TaToBa medals, given to him so he wouldn’t be dependent on Ankh being around during a conflict.  
  
When Eiji responded to his other question, Ankh frowned at him. More and more often these days, the suffocating feeling of emptiness radiated from Eiji. He'd asked about the medals many times, nearly every day checking to make sure that they weren't causing any problems. But every time he asked, he was given a similar response.  
  
"...Of course," he muttered. "I trust you." And it was true. If Eiji told him the medals weren't causing trouble, he'd believe him. After all, what reason would he have to lie to Ankh about that?   
  
It should have been comforting to hear him say 'I love you', but for some reason, Ankh felt more uneasy than comforted.  
  
He walked over, a look of alarm crossing his face as Eiji tipped forward. Ankh put a hand­­--his Greeed hand­--­on his shoulder again, not letting go this time. "I love you," he said quietly, and he really had been saying it more often lately. He had to make sure that Eiji knew. And Eiji had been saying it so much less, too, it left a gap that Ankh struggled to fill with his own words.

 

Eiji grimaced, putting both his hands over the pocket he had the three medals in protectively. He turned away at that, shaking his head. "No, no," he insisted, "I'll keep them. Just in case, you know?" He didn't want to give the medals up at all. The two sides within himself conflicted with one another on why (they made him feel less empty vs. he could betray Ankh at any time) (stop thinking like that!), but the thought remained the same: Don't give up the medals.

 

At the hand, the Greeed hand, touching him, he hissed, but (when his eyes were downcast, away from Ankh) the purple glinted briefly, and a smile was forced upon his face. He looked up at Ankh (the purple was gone, of course), and he reached out, grabbing at the point just above where the Greeed arm ended and the human began. "I'm glad you do."

 

But, he pulled Ankh's hand off of him, standing up again. He really didn't want to be touched by him, by the Greeed---after all, he was a /human/, much /more/ than a pile of ugly, cold medals (stop that, Ankh is human too) (no he's not, and you know that)---but to try and make it look casual was getting increasingly harder.

 

Putting his hands behind his head, with his back turned to Ankh, the purple returned. "Hey, Ankh, where do you keep the medal case when we sleep at night?" he asked, innocently enough. "Kazari's been restless, lately, especially with Dr. Maki joining up with them, and I wanna know where it is just in case, you know?"

 

He wished that Eiji would touch his hand, lend his warmth to Ankh’s comparatively colder hand, but he didn’t. He wished that Eiji would look at him too, but his gaze was only on him for a few moments before he turned away again, his back to Ankh.

 

Ankh furrowed his brow at the question, surprised. Usually, Eiji just let him handle the medals. It was all he could do, really, and he was the one with the most knowledge on how to best use them between the two of them. “Don’t worry about it, if anything happens I’ll probably sense it first,” he said, a little gruffly. Hadn’t they just finished agreeing that Eiji needed a break?

 

Ankh trusted Eiji, but some part of him didn’t want to tell him about this. He could take the medals, then, if he wished. But why would he? Ankh tried to clear his mind of such suspicions. It was silly to think that Eiji would steal the medals, he had no reason to.

 

“He’s been restless, but he hasn’t made a move yet. We should be ready, but…” He glanced at the other man, frowning. “Don’t worry too much about it.” He didn’t want Eiji to worry more, he seemed so tired and on edge already. “If anything happens, I’ll take care of dealing with the medals. You should focus on resting, or fighting if we need to.”

 

Ankh wanted to take his hand, make him turn around and look at Ankh. There were a lot of things Ankh wanted Eiji to do, but he wasn’t doing any of them. He switched his gaze to the ground, scowling at it and trying to conceal any expression of hurt that might’ve flickered across his face.

 

Eiji almost barked at him, "I'd sense it, too," but---but he had kept that part a secret from Ankh. For the longest while, he could also sense the Yummies and the enemy Greeed. He wasn't sure how, but he did, and it made him a little uneasy (he'd welcome uneasiness, it was a graceful change compared to the emptiness otherwise). So, he kept quiet. Ankh would know something was up, then, and he didn't want Ankh to worry---to find out, to put an end to the medals.

 

His head swam, and he practically ignored Ankh's next words as he disappeared into the kitchen. Re-emerging just a few minutes later, he unwrapped the popsicle, standing in front of Ankh.

 

"But what if you're not around?" he asked, again, innocently enough. Eiji didn't know... why he was trying so hard to find out where the medal case was. He already knew, didn't he? He knew all the hiding spots. Would he feel a little less guilty about knowing where the case resided if Ankh told him of his own accord?

 

Eiji smiled, grabbed Ankh's cheek (gently, he wanted to say, but it was a little rough around the edges) with one hand, and stuck the popsicle in his mouth. He smiled---it was a warm, inviting smile, one that hadn't shown for a very long time.

 

"We can share the burden, Ankh," he said, voice dropping to a whisper, laced with sweetness. "That's what partners are for, right?" Eiji's smile shifted, then, to one of condescension, before he turned away quickly, letting go of him altogether.

 

Ankh frowned. “Why wouldn’t I be around? You have medals for when I’m not around during the day, and we’re together at night,” he argued. He opened his mouth to further argue when Eiji stuck the popsicle in his hand into his mouth. Giving a frustrated huff, he reached up to pull out the popsicle. Any words he had died in his throat, though, when Eiji smiled at him.

 

Warmth blossomed in his chest at the smile, so familiar and comforting. Eiji had to be alright, he wouldn't smile like that otherwise.

 

Ankh leaned into the hand on his cheek a little, giving a barely perceptible sigh. It really had been stupid of him to be suspicious, right? “Yeah,” he mumbled, albeit still a little reluctantly. Eiji was right, they were a team, and Ankh could afford to be more trusting with him. “If... I’m not around, and I don’t have the medal case with me, you can find it on my bed, under the blankets, if you need it.”

 

When Eiji pulled away, Ankh started forward a little, unable to conceal disappointment. But he quickly gathered himself, fixing a scowl to his face. He didn't know why he felt the need to guard himself around Eiji lately, but he'd found himself concealing his emotions more often.

 

"...Well," he started, frowning at the ground again. "Until Kazari does do anything, I... don't think you should worry too much about it. I don't want you to worry about it. We already have those medals to get rid of." He didn't mention the King along with the medals, because he still didn't like thinking about /him/ lurking in Eiji.

 

Success. Though the real Eiji, the one that wasn't empty, hidden deep away inside of him, stirred a bit---saying he still didn't like how they were deceiving Ankh, leading him on like this, that having Ankh tell him did nothing for his guilt, but that small voice was quickly drowned out.

 

The way Ankh had leaned into him before he drew away... the way Ankh seemed so... so /vulnerable/ when he was like this... With his back turned, an ugly smile came over his face, filled with both disgust and power, paired with those purple eyes. He could end Ankh at any moment he wanted. (Please! Please don't!) Ankh could die right at his feet, looking up at him with those disgusting eyes, never to have tasted the satisfaction of being fulfilled again. (He doesn't deserve this. Please stop this!)

 

Ankh's desire and greed was apparent. And Eiji---sorry, the /King/---wanted it gone. He wanted the satisfaction of taking all that Ankh cared for and sweeping it right from under his feet.

 

(Please, please stop, I love---)

 

The purple glint was gone by the time Eiji had turned around, hands on hips, eyes closed, head tilted to the side ever so slightly. "But you haven't done anything yet, Ankh. I thought you were gonna get rid of them for me." The disgusting smile he wore only grew in size. "But, you're right, I won't worry. I have you, after all."

 

The words stung. Ankh glanced away, scowling. “You haven’t let me,” he said, a little accusing. And truthfully, it was also fear that stopped him. He dreaded the thought of being close to the hollowness again, close to the King. He didn’t think he was strong enough, but Eiji did. Or he had.

 

“If you let me, I could try again.” He said this a little hesitantly, his gaze flickering back to Eiji. He hadn’t possessed Eiji in so long, and he’d never thought he would miss it this much. He wasn’t used to feeling desire quite like this, because it was a desire that could be fulfilled. Even in his Greeed form, he found himself hardly feeling the near-constant void that all of the Greeed longed to fill. He could /almost/ feel satisfied, not whole but nearly… complete, when he was with Eiji. Possessing Eiji, he was able to find something that banished his own hollowness.

 

“You’ve said that they haven’t been causing you any pain, but… we do need to be more urgent.” Ankh looked away distractedly, frowning with the amount of worries he was juggling. He took a step closer, reaching out to try and take Eiji’s hand in his. “If you let me possess you, I’ll get rid of them now.” Was that what he had done wrong?

 

Clearly, Ankh must have done something to make Eiji’s attitude towards him change, but he’d had trouble figuring out what it was. Had he been too harsh, as he often was? Had Ankh said or done something that upset him so greatly? Had Eiji decided that he couldn’t in fact love a Greeed?

 

But Ankh had just waited impatiently so far, wondering if Eiji would tell him what mistake he had made, what Ankh had done to make him treat him this way.

 

Eiji struggled not to pull his hand away when Ankh grabbed it; he didn't want to be touched by such a lowly being (no, no, he did!) when he, himself, was a King (no! he wasn't! he wasn't a king!). But, he had to keep up appearances, didn't he? (He didn't need appearances. He loved Ankh. He did.)

 

So he squeezed the hand, head tilting the other way while the smile drooped a little. He opened his eyes and nodded, and for the first time in awhile, he didn't look tired.

 

"Of course, Ankh. You can possess me." Despite how sweet the voice came out, a hidden sense of... poison, hostility, dripped from his voice, so much so that it could've puddled at his feet. He squeezed Ankh's hand once more, tighter (too tight!), and grabbed his other hand, Ankh's right hand, by the wrist, rather than the hand (as if he was trying to never let him go, in a bad way), just as tight.

 

"I always love when you possess me, Ankh," he mentioned, taking a step closer, looking deep into Ankh's eyes with a sense of... not desire, but—something close—as if it were lust (the real Eiji inside choked; he didn't want any of this, he just wanted to be nice to Ankh again).

 

"I love being so close to you."

 

The popsicle in his hand fell when his right hand was grabbed, and Ankh almost pulled away, feeling a chill run down his spine. Even if he didn't catch the sinister edge to Eiji's words, subconsciously, he felt that something was wrong. Eiji's grip was too tight, the look in his eyes unfamiliar. He found himself trying to take a step backward, although the grip Eiji had on him stopped him.

 

He should have been glad that Eiji was finally looking at him, paying attention to him after so long, but instead, Ankh felt uneasy. Like the sudden focus on him wasn't exactly affection. He could feel very clearly the sense of nothingness Eiji exuded. Right now, rather than warmth, Ankh felt only a cold, icy feeling spread through him from Eiji's touch.

 

He hesitated, breaking eye contact as he glanced away, ducking his head down slightly so that his hair shielded his eyes from Eiji's gaze. Something was wrong, but Ankh couldn't put his finger on it.

 

Eiji had said there was no problem with the King. Eiji wouldn't lie to him about that. He couldn't be lying, because the thought of the trust Ankh had built up being betrayed for a second time was too painful to think about. So he tried to put the treacherous thought from his mind. Another replaced it, though. If Eiji wasn't lying, then maybe... he just didn't love Ankh anymore.

 

"I... can't do that if you're holding my hand," was all he found himself saying stiffly in response, finally. Eiji was often affectionate, better at initiating contact than Ankh, and he didn't mind it at all, but this was different. This felt wrong.

 

Eiji nodded, a trill of laughter cutting through. "Oh, yeah, I guess you're right, huh?" And just like that, as he scratched the back of his head and let go of Ankh, letting his hands linger on Ankh's skin, he seemed back to normal. His smile was fine, and so was his gaze—no ill intentions hidden behind either of them. His posture even slouched a little.

 

It was like nothing ever happened. He didn't look as tired, either, with the aura of emptiness lessening around him, if Ankh could sense it, and he leaned forward to hug Ankh, furrowing his brows. His grip on him seemed normal—not too tight, nothing.

 

For all intents and purposes, the King had relinquished his hold on Eiji. Eiji wasn't even aware of the changes the King had imposed on him in the first place. He thought all of this was normal, and that the medals weren't acting up at all. And with Ankh not saying anything about the weird actions... He had nothing to gauge them against.

 

Still in the embrace, he rubbed Ankh's back comfortingly and whispered in his ear, lovingly, "Ankh? Are you alright? You're acting a bit weird today, aren't you? You don't have to possess me if you don't want to, you know, or if you're not feeling well. ... Can Greeed even get sick?" he wondered idly.

 

The strange feeling around Eiji lessened, and Ankh found himself relaxing when Eiji let go of his hands. It seemed like he was... normal again. A little confused by the sudden change, Ankh was tense at first when Eiji hugged him. A few moments later, he tried to banish the uneasiness, leaning into the hug.

 

He gave a sigh when Eiji spoke, now seeming to be the more tired one. "...I'm fine. That's what I should be asking /you/," he mumbled. "You're the one acting strangely." Ankh hesitated, bringing his hands up over Eiji's back to grasp his shoulders, hugging him back a little awkwardly. He held onto him, glad that Eiji couldn't see the uncertain look on his face.

 

Ankh was glad that he wasn't acting so oddly now, and even happier that he was paying attention to him now. And yet, he couldn't shake the strange actions of a moment ago, the fact that he hadn't quite felt safe with Eiji in that moment. He wanted to clear his mind of those thoughts, but he couldn't.

 

"If I... did something," he started, voice low and careful. "Something... wrong, tell me." He hated how nervous the words came out, how vulnerable he sounded. But he had to know.

 

Eiji's brows only furrowed even more at the strange accusation. He didn't think he was acting any weirder than he already, well, was. He could admit that he was pretty weird. And, although he would have taken these accusations to heart and started to worry over whether the medals were affecting him or not -- the purple glinted in his eyes once more, with Ankh close.

 

"Me? Ankh, do you have a fever or something? Maybe the detective does."

 

By the time he pulled away, still keeping his hands on Ankh's shoulders, rubbing carefully, the purple was gone, and Eiji no longer thought he was the one acting strange.

 

He placed one hand on Ankh's forehead, pouting a little. "No... Huh. I dunno then. Maybe too much stress? You've been using Shingo a lot lately..." His head in the clouds, he had almost forgot about the second thing Ankh had said when they had still been embraced. Eiji shook his head.

 

"No, you did nothing wrong, Ankh," and he smiled a bright, goofy smile -- the one he only reserved for Ankh. "I think you're tired, too. We're both tired."

 

The emptiness was tugging on the edges of his skin, and he could feel the hairs on the back of his neck prickle. But, for some reason, he didn't find this odd, didn't wanna bring it up. So, he didn't. It was normal, right? Perfectly normal.

 

Eiji reached down to pick up the melting popsicle Ankh had dropped. "I know you said we have to be urgent, but... Hina-san and Chiyoko-san should be back soon from shopping, and it's getting late. Why don't we try tomorrow, first thing in the morning?" Eiji beamed, proud of the idea. He had... no clue that he was being influenced, subconsciously, that this idea had not been his own. He just seemed normal. "That way, it'll be after a good night's sleep for the both of us. We can go to sleep early. I'm sure it'll give Shingo-san a break too."

 

Ankh huffed, halfheartedly batting away Eiji’s hand. “I’m not sick,” he snapped. Was it really just him who noticed the changes? Troubled by this, Ankh frowned, staring at Eiji searchingly. But before he could give any other protest, the man smiled at him. That, along with the words, finally made Ankh relax again. Eiji was right, he was tired too. Not only tired, but high-strung, the amount of confusion in the past conversation setting Ankh further on edge.

 

So, maybe it really would be a good idea to get rest. It couldn’t hurt, certainly. He paused a moment, glancing at his now-monstrous right arm. He was tempted to test whether he could get away with keeping a hold on Shingo for the night. Maybe, then Eiji wouldn’t mind his presence as much. It did make sense that it probably wasn’t the most pleasant thing to hold a Greeed, and a Greeed that was nothing more than an arm, at that.

 

Ankh lingered, brow still furrowed with too many thoughts bothering him. The longer he could stay like this, the happier it would make Eiji, right? At least, that was what Ankh figured. “...Yeah, sure,” he said finally, distractedly.

 

He wanted to ask Eiji if he’d like it more to be able to hold a full body, but he’d exhausted the guts to say such self-conscious things by this point. So instead, he hung onto Shingo a little longer, breaking away from Eiji to walk over to one of the tables. He paused by a chair, a hand on it, then after a long moment, sat down. It seemed to take ages for him to separate, the arm only leaving the detective after a few more lengthy moments had passed.

 

Ankh, now merely an arm, floated over to Eiji, leaving the detective to stir and regain control on his own time. “Tomorrow, then. We’ll get rid of them, once and for all.”

 

Eiji glanced at the detective, once Ankh had left the body. He had noticed how Ankh had taken what felt like /ages/ to detach, but he didn't say anything. He didn't even think anything of it. He just... observed, which felt weird to him. Perhaps Ankh was favoring Shingo's body more. After all, it was easier to cuddle that way.

 

(Cease with this insufferable desire.)

 

But, once Shingo started to stir, and Ankh floated over to him, he perked up again, eyes lit up. "Of course, Ankh. I trust you. You'll find a way to defeat the medals somehow." His words sounded full, but there was a hollow ring to them.

 

For good measure, Eiji yawned, stretching his arms above his head. "Come on. If we go to sleep now they won't make us help," he snickered. He didn't grab Ankh, though, but he did run to the room. He quickly changed and slipped into bed, just as the sun finished setting all the way.

 

"Turn the lights off, Ankh, okay? Just you and me." In the darkness, alone. Vulnerable. "I'm gonna hold you tight all night, so you sleep even easier."

 

Ankh followed more slowly, still lost in thought. Getting to the room, he shut off the lights as he came in, shutting the door behind him. Darkness crept into the room, the last rays of sunlight quickly disappearing. He heard Eiji speak, voice muffled and distorted. Just the two of them. That was a comforting thought, and he tried to ignore the small voice that reminded him that it wasn’t just the two of them. It was never just the two of them, really.  
  
But nothing rang oddly to him anymore, Eiji seemed to be fine. He hoped he was, at least. He’d trust that he was, because Eiji had insisted he was fine. He trusted Eiji, for better or worse. If Eiji said he was fine, he was fine, and if Eiji… said that he didn’t love him anymore, then he didn’t love him anymore. But Ankh didn’t want to think that, because he had /promised/ him-- It was stupid to hang onto promises, but this was one Ankh wanted to believe.  
  
Eiji wouldn’t leave him, he’d always be his partner, he loved him. Ankh felt stupid just thinking it. clinging to those words. Weak. But he couldn’t help it. He’d tried to banish them before, but he knew now that they wouldn’t leave. And it was alright, maybe, to hang onto those words, if it was because of Eiji.  
  
The arm slipped into bed with the man, curling up in the crook of his neck almost hungrily, starved for inviting words and actions that showed that Eiji did want him there. “Good,” he murmured, giving a soft sigh. The hollowness a distant ache easily ignored, Ankh focused on Eiji, trying to absorb the warmth from his skin, listening to him breathe. None of the strangeness from earlier seemed to matter. Ankh felt safe, now.

 

Eiji allowed him to cuddle up with him, and he placed his arms around him protectively, holding him in place, fingers curling around him. "Good night, Ankh," then, lower, with a distinctive hollow tone to it, "I love you."

 

He fell asleep--or seemingly fell asleep--rather quick. His breath had slowed down, as did his pulse, and he relaxed, though his grip on Ankh didn't loosen up. He waited until Ankh was asleep too. He waited until Ankh was at his most vulnerable, deep in a sleep cycle that seemed entirely too human for a disgusting Greeed like him.

 

When Eiji opened his eyes, they were purple, and he no longer smiled. He kept the arm within reach, peeling him away ever so slightly, without waking him. His hand hovered over Ankh's stretch of forearm, and he permitted himself a smirk before, just as he had more than eight hundred years ago, reached into him.

 

He was quick about it, too, and, for good measure, he hid the purple glint in his eyes. The King wanted Ankh to feel as if this was Eiji, not him. That's why he even put on that fake act all today, all to get Ankh back to trusting him, back to his most vulnerable. He wanted all of Ankh's desire to be gone. To be destroyed. By him.

 

Eiji stole all of Ankh's cores, save for the main one. He clutched them in his hand, and rolled over and off the bed, slipping his shoes he had hidden under on. He hurried over to the perch, where he grabbed the entire medal case and the OOOs driver, and soon, he had crossed the room to the other side, near the open window, where the rain leaked in and soaked everything. He smiled, all toothy, all Eiji---that smile only reserved for Ankh.

 

"Ankh, Ankh, happy birthday. Thank you for everything."

 

And before Ankh could retaliate, before he could react, Eiji had climbed out the window, just as a flash of lightning had struck down.

 

Ankh thought he was dreaming, at first. He shifted in discomfort, thinking blearily that he dreamed of that time so long ago, eight hundred years ago when he had lost the first of his medals. It wasn’t unusual for him to dream of the past. But as he stirred back to consciousness, the discomfort didn’t leave. He found himself feeling weaker, so much weaker than he had in a while.

 

“...Eiji?” He mumbled, confused. Looming over him, he saw the form of the man, and following the distorted form as it extended towards him, he noted with muddled alarm that Eiji’s hand was inside of him. What was he doing? The simple thought, born of exhaustion, soon got an answer.

 

Ankh couldn’t hold back a cry of pain when the medals were ripped from him, feeling terror course through him. This wasn’t a dream, he realized quickly. “E-Eiji--” He gasped. What was he doing? Why?

 

Eiji wouldn’t leave him, he wouldn’t hurt him, he would always be his partner. He’d promised Ankh that. Eiji had lied. Although it was only medals taken by a human hand, it felt like a hundred more claws driven through him. Eiji had lied to him. He’d betrayed him. He was smiling that smile that made Ankh feel so warm, but right now, he only felt very cold. Maybe it was the lack of medals.

 

Weakly dragging himself to the edge of the bed, Ankh found himself calling out Eiji’s name as he disappeared, too overwhelmed to be angry yet. Right now, he just felt hollow. He had been so stupid. He couldn’t even bring himself to be angry at himself. He just thought, dumbfounded, hollowly, that he had been such a fool. Eiji was supposed to be different, Eiji had cared for him. Had he?

 

But he was gone, now. He was gone, and Ankh couldn’t muster the strength to move. It was the dead of night, no one here so late besides the two of them. No. Besides Ankh. He couldn’t do anything, call out to anyone. Ankh lay there, pain wracking his being, feeling very cold, and very hollow. “Eiji,” he said weakly to the empty room, choking on nonexistent tears.

 


	6. Chapter 6

OOOs still fought.   
  
Yummies were still being created. They needed to be destroyed, vanquished, robbed of their cell medals. Although hundreds of years ago, the King would've basked in this (as he did so long, long ago), he felt nothing towards them now. Only one thing kept him going: Destroy the desire.   
  
Desire felt disgusting. Although he knew he needed cell medals to keep up his power, every time Eiji inserted one into his body, he felt a chill run up his spine. _These are necessary for power,_ he thought every time. _Dom't think of it too hard._   
  
So, of course, he listened to that little voice in his head (bad idea), and he continued to collect cell medals to fuel his lack of desire.   
  
"Seiya!"   
  
A few things remained from Eiji's personality. Such a thing was worth it. As the red combo flew through the air, raining down projectiles, and the enemy fell, Eiji bent town to begin to pick up the medals, injecting them into his body as he chuckled. The laugher stopped abruptly, however, as he began to sense a presence behind him.   
  
Eiji stood up, turned around, and the laughter filled the air again. He removed the medals from the driver, revealing himself. Eiji looked... Tired. Like he legit hadn't slept in days. He looked tired, and somewhat scared, thought completely and utterly with confident. He wouldn't lose his medals again to this stupid biird brain loser.   
  
"Ankh," he said, extending his arms to his sides, welcoming, "long time so no see.”

 

Ankh hadn't been quite sure how to explain it to the others. It should have been easy. 'Eiji betrayed us' was all he needed to say, really. He'd put on a colder demeanor, not appearing too bothered in front of the two Births.  
  
But he slipped in front of Hina often, and even in their divided internal state of mind, Shingo could feel the pain that radiated from Ankh. He never said anything, and Hina never cut in if she walked in on him holding back silent tears, pretending she hadn't noticed and allowing him privacy with his grief.  
  
Date and Gotou had set up some... stupid system, where Ankh could help them locate Yummies. He didn't want to, but he didn't know what else to do, and he'd been promised a share of the cell medals. Maybe they pitied him. He was so weak, with only his main core right now.  
  
This was one such day, Ankh tracking this particular Yummy to this spot. Feeling the monster's presence fade, he continued forward in confusion, until he saw a familiar form that answered his question.   
  
Ankh tensed at Eiji's greeting, eyes narrowing. He drew himself up, drawing in a deep breath along with it. One part of him ached to just ask him why he'd done it, if everything really had been just an act... But instead, he leveled a glare at him. "Yeah," he practically spat.  
  
He kept his distance from the man, trying to conceal how much he shook, how weak he was. Eiji would probably be able to guess easily his state, considering his lack of medals, but a cursory pretense was better than nothing.  
  
"Give my medals back," he said suddenly, demandingly. "I don't care what you do with the others. Give mine back."

 

Eiji leaned forward almost comically, one hand on his hip with the other cupping his ear. "Haaaaah?" Laughter followed the overdramatic interjection. "What did you saaaay, Ankh? I can't hear you!"

 

He hurried forward, small yet quick steps carrying him a little closer. He cupped his ear again, struggling to keep himself from laughing.

 

"Maybe you're so quiet because I have your cores. Do you think that's it?"

 

He brushed a hand over the driver, where the three red medals resided. Eiji looked down, pulled the Taka medal out, running his hands over it almost lovingly. He wondered if Ankh could feel his fingers, could feel the way he suddenly squeezed it, as if he had intent to shatter it. He slipped it back into the driver, and tilted the device.

 

"You know, I've always loved using Tajador," he mused, unhooking the scanner and holding it up. "Power courses through me, you know? You must've been really powerful, Ankh. What a shame you've been reduced to just a fraction of what you once were."

 

The laughter that followed mixed with the call, as the armor enveloped him.

 

"Hey, Ankh, do you feel full? Do you feel desire?"

 

His scowl only deepened as he was taunted, and he took a few steps back to maintain the distance between them, trying to ignore how unsteady his legs felt. Cell medals could only do so much to make up for cores. Ankh felt a shiver up his spine at the touch to his medals. They were part of his body, even when separated from the main core, he could feel them, and here he could feel the peculiar cold that seeped into them from Eiji’s fingers.

 

Realizing Eiji’s intent to transform, Ankh stopped himself from stepping back further. Either he was just trying to scare Ankh, or he meant to attack him. Ankh didn’t want to think that he’d attack him, but he couldn’t trust Eiji not to. He reached into his jacket, hand lingering on one of the green candroids he’d brought with him. He’d give Eiji the benefit of the doubt. He wanted to talk to him before he called for any help.

 

The words were more painful than the threat of attack, though. He couldn’t think of anything to say in retort, so he stood there mutely when Eiji transformed, unable to keep a pained expression off his face.

 

“Stop it,” he said, first quietly.

 

Did he feel full? Certainly not. He felt empty, desire tugging violently at his medals, urging him to fill the ever-growing void. He felt desire all too strongly. Painfully so. “Shut up!” He barked now, loudly and as aggressively as he could muster.

 

“What the /hell/ are you doing?! Was this the plan all along? String me along like a damn fool and take the medals for yourself?” It was hard to keep his voice from breaking.

 

Eiji took another step closer to him. It was easy to see how terrified--how hurt, all those human emotions--Ankh really was. That human face gave him away too easily. The King hated it. He didn't create the Greeed to feel. He created the Greeed to desire--and he wanted to destroy that desire, now.

 

He bent forward, throwing up a heart sign with both of his hands in front of him. "Nooo... Of course not!" His voice was so sickly sweet, so horrible, even though it had been muffled by the helmet. "I really did love you, Ankh. At one point. But..."

 

(Please stop, I still do.)

 

"You're not human, like me." Another step forward as he straightened himself. The great wings of fire unfurled from his back, more so to show off, as he didn't take to the sky. "I sat down and thought to myself, 'Who could ever love a pile of medals? Medals are useless things.'" He tapped his head with one finger. "You're not even alive, Ankh. You don't even have a pulse. How can I be expected to love something with no pulse?"

 

Eiji closed the distance between them suddenly, curling his wings around to the front, in order to keep Ankh from running away. The eyes on the helmet flickered purple for just a minute before returning to their normal color. He brought one hand up, aiming to grab onto Ankh's right arm, trying to pry him away from the detective.

 

"It was stupid of me to love you in the first place, wasn't it?"

 

With every word, he might as well have been stabbed over and over again, such was the ache in his chest. Not in his chest, he thought bitterly, in the detective’s chest. The pain radiated from the detective’s human heart, the detective’s limbs were those that felt weak and trembling. The part of Ankh that was really him felt nothing like that.

 

If he had been human, would Eiji have decided to do this? Would he have continued to love Ankh if he wasn’t a Greeed? Probably. /Who could ever love a pile of medals? You’re not even alive. You don’t even have a pulse./ Ankh had asked himself similar things many times throughout his time with Eiji, but it felt much, much worse to hear it from Eiji.

 

Before Eiji came closer, Ankh pulled the candroid from his jacket, whispering instructions to find and bring back the two Births. He twisted to toss it away from them, the small robot shifting to leave the scene, and as he turned back, it was too late to get away before he was trapped.

 

Eiji caught hold of his arm, but Ankh grabbed onto it as well, trying to wrench himself out of his grip, his weak human hand struggling to keep himself from being detached. He felt sharp pain when the detective’s fingers slipped over the plates of his right arm just a little too harshly, and blood welled up in the ensuing cuts. He faltered a little, both from the words and the effort he was exerting. Shingo’s body really had been pushed too far as of late, and with Ankh having only one core medal, neither of the two were in any shape to support the other.

 

“It was /my/ mistake to think you did,” he hissed, giving another wrench to try and pull his arm away. “Or to think that I could trust you.” He had been so, so stupid.

 

Eiji tilted his head, pressing the wings in further, closing them in closer towards both of them. Of course, he knew /he/ would be fine if the flames licked at the armor. The same couldn't be said for the poor human that Ankh had drug into all of this. He had seen the candroid fly off, but he said nothing about it, not even sparing it a second glance.

 

He was unstoppable. None of those pathetic friends that Ankh could call could even /try/ to stop him. So, of course, he paid no mind to it. He only focused on Ankh.

 

Even while the other struggled pathetically to try and pull his arm away, Eiji barely moved at all. He tugged once, then twice, not even exerting his full strength. He reached forward with his other hand, resting it on Ankh's face, cupping his cheek, as if lovingly.

 

"C'mon, Ankh. I'm dying for that final core. Then I'll find your other ones, too. You'll live through me, without any desire at all..."

 

Right before he was about to exert all of his strength to force separate the human and Greeed, something hit him from behind. He had been too caught up with Ankh to focus on anything else, and he thought, 'Ah, must be those friends.' He wasn't exactly hidden with giant wings made of fire, now, was he?

 

He released Ankh, pulled his wings back, hopefully letting him fall to the ground. The wings disappeared, and he turned around to face who had shot him. A singular Birth stood, but he didn't have that gun. Then, it had to have been the other one. Where had he gone...? It didn't matter. The man in front of him had the biggest desire to destroy.

 

Eiji took a step forward, to separate himself from Ankh, waving a hand. "Hooh? Date-san, do you desire? Are you full?"

 

The suited man in front of him said nothing, just grunted. He was glad that no one could see him beneath the helmet, for he really didn't want his opponent to see how scared he was. "Hino... Is that really you in there?"

 

"Of course!" barked the King. "It's Eiji Hino, in the flesh."

 

"What happened?"

 

Eiji didn't respond. He simply removed the red cores, tossing in the Tatoba cores instead. After the change had been scanned in, the green eyes blinked purple several times, as if they were glitching, before finally steadying out to pure purple.

 

"Date-san, are you going to answer me? Don't you feel desire?" He pulled the sword out, taking slow, cautious steps towards Birth.

 

Ankh jolted away when flames just barely licked his skin, moving closer to Eiji. He wanted to recoil away from him, but there was no room to move. “I’d rather break it myself than give it to you,” he spat, giving another useless tug. If Eiji took the core that contained Ankh himself, Ankh would cease to have a physical body, become trapped and unable to do anything, completely at Eiji’s mercy.

 

Panic coursed through him, his grip on his arm growing weak and his legs threatening to give out. He was going to be separated, and then he would be even weaker, even easier to destroy. But at the sign that help had arrived, he found his defeat delayed. When Ankh was released, he dropped to the ground, dizzy with relief. On his knees, he clutched his right arm to his chest, still finding it in him to loathe how weak he appeared right now.

 

Date steeled himself when Eiji repeated the question. “Well sure, doesn’t every human being?” He humored him, hoping to figure out what was happening. “Gotou-chan, grab Anko!” He instructed, directing the words to his partner who had circled around to Eiji’s back. Gotou complied, carefully moving forward to get hold of Ankh and drag him to his feet, hoping to move him away from OOOs.

 

Ankh shuddered when the combo changed, feeling the purple medals more strongly than he had in a long while. He hadn’t realized until now how the feeling of the medals practically oozed off of Eiji, pervasive and creeping. It made him feel sick. Something was wrong, but his mind was too muddled to put his finger on it.

 

Date, meanwhile, focused on Eiji, thinking he could talk him down and make sense of the situation. Ankh seemed to be either in the dark or unwilling to talk to them, but either way, he hadn’t been any help as to understanding what had happened. “Hino, what’re you trying to pull here? I know you and Anko fight, but if this is some quarrel between you two, it’s gone too far.”

 

Eiji raised the sword over his head, to the sky, pointing it to the sun. "Yes, exactly, Date-san," was all he said, and had they been able to see under the helmet, he would've been grinning ear to ear, disgustingly happy with himself.

 

He lowered the sword, resting it against his shoulder, and glanced back over at Date. "You're correct. Splendid work, Date-san! All humans have desire. All humans have needs and wants that they want to fulfill." With his free hand, he pointed to his head, taking another step forward. "You have a mighty desire, Date-san. I can sense it... How nice, how quaint."

 

Birth could only cock his head to the side, and he pulled out a cell medal, slipping it into he driver, yet not turning just yet. "What?" he said, trying to play it off. "Of course, it's big. Or whatever you said, Hino. I gotta earn this much." He held one finger up to the sky.

 

Eiji had froze in his spot, and he let out a long string of laughter. "How pathetic. I want to see you miserable, with your desire destroyed," the lights blinked green, "just as mine was," they were purple once more.

 

When Eiji ran at him, Date turned the lever with a satisfying 'pop!' resonating within the area. Drill Arm activated, he matched the sword, and pushed Eiji away. They went at one another like cats and dogs, and Eiji clearly had the intent to kill.

 

Gotou, of course, was worried about his superior, but he couldn't really do anything about it. If Ankh collapsed while he had run off, he'd be in direct line of fire without any chance of being able to move. So he couldn't leave Ankh's side. He didn't want to, either, for this had to be hard on Ankh especially.

 

The silence he had built up with Ankh was broken with the sound of a clearing throat. Gotou glanced over, and Satonaka stood there, with a television monitor in her hand. "I have a message for Ankh," she said, and the monitor squeaked to life. Kougami's eye filled the entire screen before he pulled away.

 

"Ankh! Happy birthday! Do you know what momentous day this is for you?"

 

Oh /great/, Ankh found it in him to think exasperatedly as he practically hung off of Gotou, making the other man stumble more than a little to support his weight. He switched his gaze from the battle to the screen, fixing Kougami with an exhausted glare. “Shut up,” he snapped weakly.

 

The man didn’t even bat an eyelash at Ankh’s rudeness, just beaming at him. “Ankh! I have a present for you! You seem to be in a little bit of a bind, after all. Those pesky purple medals… They’re the opposite of desire, much too depressing for my taste. Satonaka-kun, if you please?” Satonaka held the monitor in one hand, stepping over to the car parked a few feet away. She set the monitor down, begin to pull a large box from the back seat. It almost resembled a coffin.

 

Gotou and Ankh watched her pry open the box, baffled. Ankh, however, pulled himself up a little, energy seeming to return as he felt something stir inside him. As if something in the box was calling out to his medal.

 

Eiji and Date still fought behind the three, Date trying to steer Eiji away from the group once he noticed them. Once the lid was off, Satonaka returned to pick up the monitor, holding it up again. Ankh’s eyes widened, and he pushed off of Gotou to stumble over to the box, falling to his knees next to it. The figure inside looked rather like a mummy of some kind.

 

At Ankh’s touch, the body seemed to change, the colors of its feathers growing brighter. “This is…” He started, but found himself too impatient to finish the sentence. It was him. His own body. It was just missing the right arm, the arm attached to the detective right now. He could feel medals inside it too, and he longed to just reattach himself right now.

 

“Happy birthday, Ankh!” Kougami repeated, boisterous and loud as always. “I believe this is yours, yes?”

 

But Ankh didn’t reply, instead detaching himself from the detective, who slumped over the coffin. The arm floated to sink down onto the body’s right arm, unable to bear being separated any longer, desperate to put an end to the weakness that slowed him. Once attached, the body jolted, then stilled again, for a long, long moment. Gotou and Satonaka stood over the box and its occupant uncertainly, Gotou pulling up the unconscious detective to lean him against him after a moment. Shingo seemed to be out cold, from the prior strain.

 

Date, in the meanwhile, continued to try and steer Eiji away from the three, placing himself between them and his opponent.

 

"Hoooh?"

 

As Date and Eiji fought, they bantered, even if it couldn't really be called banter when one was trying to kill the other. The attacks that Eiji managed to land were devastating, though he clearly held back from killing him outright or damaging the Birth system beyond repair—almost as if he were playing with his food.

 

"I seemed to have hit a weak spot, haven't I?" continued Eiji, taunting Date with quick attacks and elite dodges. He had changed out the Batta medal for Cheetah, awhile ago, though his eyes still glowed that eerie purple and the sense of hollowness oozed off of him.

 

"Dunno what you're talking about, Hino!" Date grunted. He continued to put space in between Eiji and the others. Although he wasn't sure what was really going on over there, Satonaka was holding a monitor, so clearly Kougami was up to something that would change the game. If only it would activate or something. That would help him a lot. When he glanced behind him every now and then, he had seen glimpses of Ankh detaching himself, and Gotou now holding the detective.

 

"You're so selfish, Date-san, it's sort of admirable," said Eiji, pulling out some more medals, though not changing just yet. "I only wish that you can experience the same type of despair I—"

 

Just as Eiji was about to insert the medals, he paused. He felt a strong pull, a strong sort of—not desire, but /something/ that made him freeze in his tracks. It was the familiar feeling of Ankh, and the intensity of it made him... feel.

 

The eyes blinked green, and he seemed to desperately yell out, "Ankh!" before they returned to purple, and he looked angrier than he had been before.

 

"Enough playing around," Date said. The way Eiji had yelled out Ankh's name then... It seemed suspicious, but he wasn't one to talk people down in such a scenario. "Just... come back to us, Hino."

 

Eiji took a step back, shaking his head. I'm in control now, thought the King, though every so often, Eiji would surface, like he did just a few minutes ago—or like how he was trying to do so now. The King bent down, forced to one knee, and he—no, Eiji—cried out in pain, holding his head in both hands, shaking it furiously.

 

"No, no, no!" their voice said, distorted, warbling. The eye color switched rapidly between green and purple for several long minutes like this. But...

 

He was a King. He would not lose.

 

"Enough!" the distorted voice yelled, getting to his feet once more, the purple eyes steady. He slipped in the Kujaku and Condor medals, and as he tilted the driver, a purple medal escaped his chest and into the driver. He ran the scanner over it, and when it didn't register, he growled and /forced/ it to register. The transformation change glitched, in a way, and the resulting chant, as it gave off the names of the medals used, the driver's voice cut in and out before fizzling out completely, even before the last medal.

 

"Ankh!" Eiji yelled. Every so often, the eyes would blink back and forth, as if the green was trying to win, but the purple would always come out on top. "Who would've thought that Kougami bastard had the rest of you, huh?! I'll take them all and destroy your hope and desire! Face me!"

 

Ankh would deal with Kougami later. How long had that bastard known the location of his body? How long had he had it? The body jolted again as the medals realigned themselves, the main core pulling everything back together and merging the two forms. Ankh could hear Eiji calling his name even as his body didn’t quite move yet. It was strange… It sounded… /different/. Familiar. The tone wasn’t anything like how Eiji had spoken earlier.

 

“Eiji…?” The Greeed spoke, not exactly loudly, feeling himself finally able to move, properly put back together. He sat up shakily, limbs that hadn’t moved in over eight hundred years a little unwilling to work quite right.

 

Almost without thinking, the feathered Greeed shifted forms, back to his human guise. He felt… not whole, but close to it. He felt stronger, for sure. His senses were, of course, dulled. He wasn’t sure why he’d thought that switching to the human form would change this. He turned to look at Eiji, just as the man put in the next combination of medals, which made Ankh start, pushing himself to his feet.

 

His cores in the belt resonated with the ones in his body, and when the combination was forced, Ankh hissed in pain, grabbing his chest. Although significantly less, he could feel the unpleasant sensation of his medals and the purple ones being forced together. He practically ignored the three humans around him, walking forward towards the two combatants.

 

“Eiji!” He yelled, moving closer to the armored man and staggering less as his body slowly acclimated to moving again. He shifted back to his Greeed form. This was no fight for a human. He felt more secure with his own armor, with his talons and taller stature.

 

Date looked as though he was ready to step in, but Ankh stopped him, speaking. “Don’t interfere, Birth!” This was between the two of them. He stepped closer to Eiji, pausing in his steps then, still a cautious distance away. The Greeed tilted his head, feeling the awful aura of the purple medals coming off of Eiji in waves.

 

He took another step forward, ready to strike back if he needed too, but not wanting to attack yet. For one thing, he was still getting used to being in his own body. And… if something truly had changed Eiji, as he suspected, he didn’t want to hurt him.

 

“Eiji… Those medals… They’ve done something to you. ...Why the hell are you doing this?” He spoke harshly, but a hint of concern could be heard in the first words.

 

There was silence.

 

Then, raucous laughter resounded throughout the area. Eiji dropped the somewhat hostile pose for something much more relaxed, much more like himself.

 

"The medals? They've done nothing," he replied. He rolled his shoulders and head, laughing again. "Nope. Well, alright. Maybe they did."

 

He put his hands on his hips, puffing out his chest proudly. "Yeah. I think what they did is just amplify how much I learned to hate you, Ankh." More laughter followed, and he took a few steps towards Ankh, though he didn't aim to hurt him, didn't look like he was about to attack.

 

He did stand there with pride, and he unfurled his wings once more. The fire blazed around him, with such intensity that it turned even Birth away, who shielded his eyes from it.

 

"Ankh, you really are pathetic," Eiji spat, and he used Ankh's wings to take to the sky. He hovered, the sun behind him making him seem holier than he really was. A halo appeared around his head.

 

If one squinted, one could see the eyes change to green, and he muttered, "Run."

 

But, that moment only lasted an instant, and suddenly, he dove down. Date tried to shoot him down, but the wings brushed off every medal thrown at him.

 

Eiji seemed as if he was going for Ankh, but he faked him out, and he touched down behind Gotou and Shingo. The wings pushed Satonaka, who shut the computer and hurried away, nearly falling before she slammed against the car door. She reached in, grabbing the gun she had, loaded it, and shot at Eiji. He brushed it off, and before Gotou could react, Eiji grabbed both him and Shingo by the collar.

 

Date swore beneath his breath, hurrying over to them, but Eiji was quicker, freezing Birth in place with the purple medal.

 

"Too bad, too bad!" Eiji taunted. He took to the sky again, with Shingo and Gotou in his hands. "Ankh, if you want them to live, meet me at the place me and you first met tomorrow at midnight."

 

And with that, he laughed and flew off, disappearing into the horizon.

 


	7. Chapter 7

It was silent and empty in the darkened plaza as Ankh touched down from his flight, not another soul in sight. Straightening and drawing in his wings, the Greeed shifted back to his human form. It felt… more natural, being like this. With it, he could almost pretend that he sensed things as clearly as a human. He’d had to assume the form back at the restaurant, of course, so Chiyoko didn’t have a heart attack over an eight-foot bird monster in her kitchen.

 

Date had wanted to come, nearly frantically concerned over Gotou, but Ankh had convinced him to just be on standby, for Ankh to call should he need help.

 

He hadn’t come for Gotou, though, or for Date, not really. He’d come for the human body he was quickly realizing he missed very much, and the look in Hina’s eyes hearing that her brother had been taken and it was /Eiji’s/ doing, and… for Eiji.

 

Ankh didn’t know what to think about it. The medals were so clearly affecting him in some way, but how much? How much sway did the King have? Ankh had almost been able to forget his presence, but he had to be a factor too. But it was always possible that Eiji was speaking the truth. That the medals just amplified disgust and hatred that was already there.

 

He looked around carefully for any sign of Eiji, or either of his hostages. It was nearly midnight, just one or two minutes till. Date had asked him what he would do, and truthfully, Ankh didn’t know himself what his plan was. It involved getting back the pesky humans, not losing his medals in the process, and… Well, he didn’t know what to do about Eiji. Talk to him? Fight him? So much was unclear. He didn’t know whether he should be saving Eiji or striking him down. Although he’d steeled himself to a violent end, reminding himself of the betrayal, of Eiji’s harsh words, a part of Ankh begged whatever power out there that he wouldn’t have to.

 

“Oi, I’m here!” He yelled, his voice bouncing around the area. “Wherever you are, get out here so we can get down to business!”

 

Only the echoes of Ankh's voice followed for several very, very long minutes. Something rustled in the shadows, and soon, Eiji--untransformed--emerged, with one of the same thing in each hand. He had a box under his elbow, and neither Gotou nor Shingo seemed to be in sight.

 

He approached Ankh quietly, and once he was fully basking in the moonlight, it was easy to see him--he had several spots of blood on his face and clothes, with a wild (yet... somehow gentle, something like the "real" Eiji would make after winning a fight and looking over to see that Ankh was unharmed) look on his face. He wore the OOO belt, though no medals were present inside the three slots. Most notably were the way his hair seemed to be more windswept, swept back away from his face for the most part, with lavender streaks that seemed to have been forced in.

 

"Ankh," he said gingerly, holding out one of the popsicles in his hands to him, "I got you one. This is you favorite flavor, right?" He took a bite of the other one, approaching slowly still--not that he was scared or anything, but just that he seemed... tired.

 

"You still love me, right, Ankh? I don't know what I'd do without you..." he mused quietly. Before Ankh could take the popsicle, or before Ankh could even want it, when he stood about five feet away from the other, he dropped it, and he tilted his head, with such a deranged expression, one could wonder if he was alright. He took another bite of his own popsicle, and his eyes slowly faded to purple, and he smiled so kindly, so tenderly, so lovingly.

 

As the ice melted on the ground between them, Eiji, with his arm that had dropped the stick still outstretched towards Ankh, began to laugh. It started out quiet, then gradually grew in loudness, until the only thing that could be heard was his laughter.

 

"Ankh, Ankh, Ankh! You experience such human emotions. Splendid! I love it!" he exclaimed. He tossed his own popsicle to the side, into the shadows; he held his head with one hand, palm against his forehead and elbow up, head thrown back, as he laughed, and he laughed, and he laughed.

 

All of a sudden, it stopped. The purple in his eyes intensified, until the original color could not be seen at all, and they focused on Ankh. The smile dropped clean off his face, replaced with a scowl, a sneer.

 

"It is disgusting. You are just a disgusting pile of medals. How can you expect to be human? To even show up in your human form... You really do ache to be something you cannot ever be."

 

It was a greeting Ankh certainly wasn’t expecting. He’d steeled himself for more aggression, more of a clear fight, but he just looked at the popsicle in Eiji’s hand instead, frozen.

 

/You still love me, right, Ankh?/ He almost spoke in response, almost affirmed that /yes/, yes he did. But the blood on Eiji and the sickening hollowness that radiated from him stopped him, no matter how much the gesture or the words pulled at him to move closer, trust that face again. The urge left him at the sight of the ice on the ground, the unnatural eyes, the horrible expression that twisted Eiji’s features.

 

He recoiled that the next words. The way Eiji spoke was so familiar, in an unpleasant way, sending a shiver up his spine. He called him disgusting. A pained expression crossed his face, and he took a step back. No, he had to remind himself, if he was right, then this wasn’t entirely Eiji. But how much of it /was/ Eiji, another part of him asked treacherously.

 

“I…” He hated how weakly he began speaking. What did he want to say? That he did ache to be human? That he wanted it partly because maybe, possibly, then Eiji would be able to love him? He should’ve been asking about Gotou and Shingo, but he was more focused on something else right now. “I don’t have time for this.” He made a good attempt at making his voice harsh and gruff.

 

“Stop trying to play me for some kind of /idiot/. Even an idiot like him wouldn’t…” He faltered, but Ankh tried to remember Eiji’s old smile, the things he’d once told Ankh. “He wouldn’t say things like that. Are you even trying to hide yourself anymore?” He was partly bluffing, partly demanding sincerely. His mind was so tangled, unsure, but he tried to hold onto the hope that his suspicion was right, that Eiji wasn’t in his right mind. With the entire demeanor and appearance of the man, he hoped very dearly that it was.

 

“You think I don’t already think things like that? You think I don’t realize how pathetic I am?!” He glared, now, raising his voice. “I’m not here to be told things I already know. I’m here for the humans.”

 

When Ankh called him out, Eiji's entire demeanor changed. He dropped his hands to his side, loosely hanging there without a care in the world. His shoulders slumped, and for a minute, shadows completely covered his face. The silence stretched on, and on, and on, even after Ankh raised his voice and the echoes had died down.

 

And, he laughed again. A deranged, merciless laugh, he threw his head back, and he laughed. Catching his breath, he took a shaky step forward, clutching at his stomach and pointing weakly. The smile on his face seemed... foreign, and like it didn't belong on Eiji's face at all.

 

"Ankh, Ankh, you finally got it! Happy birthday, Ankh!" he exclaimed, and then threw his arms out to the side, as if he were getting ready to embrace Ankh, despite their distance between one another still. "Wonderful! Splendid! Eiji-kun here is a perfect host for me, as we are so similar, don't you think?"

 

He snickered, and he lowered his hands, scratching at his face--an Eiji mannerism, one he had done in embarrassment many a times before. When he spoke, it took on an innocent tone. "But, hey, hey, Ankh, what part of me is real? What did the King do to me? How do I feel about you?" Because of the timing, and the foreign smile still residing on Eiji's features, one could infer the fact that it was an act entirely, and a damned good one at that.

 

"I always felt bad you were not human, Ankh, but I tried to put it past me. That is why I," still with the fake tone, and this time, another Eiji mannerism: He held his hands behind his head, kicking one foot out so it only rested on the heel, with his tongue sticking out slightly before he continued talking, "wanted you to be human so bad. But, in the end, the King helped me realize, you could not be that. So!" A quiet, Eiji laugh. "I betrayed you, Ankh!"

 

Eiji folded his hands behind his back, pacing from side to side, not taking a step towards Ankh at all. "... Yes, splendid! Truly, Eiji-kun and I are similar." The tone was more serious now, a rough contrast to the playfulness of the "Eiji" act. "Even though we betrayed you for different reasons. The thing is, Ankh, you were always too human, and I never liked it much. Eiji-kun, on the other hand, realized that you were just a sack of coins and left you. All I had to do was make his true lack of desire for you apparent. Wonderful!"

 

He stopped pacing, faced Ankh once more, and clapped his hands in front of him. "Though, I should show you, now, since you came all the way out here for them." He disappeared into the shadows, running off a little comically to the side, and after a few grunts--not from him--he dragged two bodies out.

 

Both were tied with rope extremely tightly, twice on their legs, once on their ankles, once on their wrists (wrapped behind their backs), and once more on their upper arms. Only one was conscious, and although Gotou struggled, he couldn't free himself. Both bled from wounds on their heads, though Shingo's blood seemed to have already dried. Quite a lot of already blooming bruises dotted along Gotou's exposed skin, and many more were sure to be underneath his clothes. Their conditions were decidedly worse off than when they had been kidnapped initially.

 

Eiji crouched down, behind the pair of hostages, in the center. He reached around Gotou and brushed hair from his eyes, pulling back his hand just far enough to rest it on his shoulder. Although Gotou did not have a gag, he did not say anything; he only looked at Ankh with pseudo-steeled eyes (for, underneath it all, he was scared out of his wits, and his eyes couldn't lie).

 

"Weeeell, Ankh, I believe we can negotiate, huh? I just want to talk."

 

Ankh felt sick as the man spoke, twisting and pulling Eiji’s features into unnatural expressions, using his voice to say things Ankh had heard eight hundred years ago, out of another mouth. “No. He’s nothing like you,” he retorted, the hateful glare on his face only growing deeper.  
  
He just glared through the tirade, impatience urging him to just grab the man by the throat and wring the truth and the two hostages out of him. Ankh’s angered expression, however, didn’t quite hold, a much more vulnerable look of betrayal flickering at the edges of his facade. It made sense, Eiji’s reasons, if that truly had been Eiji. That, or the King had had control much earlier than Ankh had thought. Which would mean that the dates, the nights spent together, everything would have been a very convincing act. He didn’t want to think about that possibility. But if it was merely the King’s influence amplifying an underlying desire… or rather, lack thereof...  
  
/’You could not be that, so I betrayed you.’/ The further he spoke, the worse Ankh’s chest ached. So it /was/ because of his body, his unimaginably bad luck to be made a creature such as this, that of course no human could be expected to love.  
  
He gave a huff, derisive and sounding quite forced. “I guess... I can’t blame you on that, Eiji, if that’s really how you feel. I wouldn’t love something like me either.” Ankh spoke casually, flippantly head tilted down and to the side, to conceal the treacherous eyes that burned with… tears? Unshed ones, but if one were to see his expression, the glistening in his eyes would give him away easily. Ankh’s tears were exceedingly rare, and usually very private. It didn’t appear to be so in this situation, though.  
  
A frustrated growl, and he brought up his arm to quickly disperse of the tears, rubbing his eyes harshly. “Well, now that I know how it is, then, we have nothing else to talk about.”  
  
Thankfully, he didn’t have to hear any more of the painful words when the King disappeared, then returned with the two bodies. He glanced over them, his eyes meeting Gotou’s briefly. He looked back at him hollowly, his own eyes betraying a deep pain to the man he usually just barely tolerated. It was gone, though, once he looked at Shingo briefly--not in good shape, but certainly alive, if not conscious--and then switched his gaze to Eiji--the King?--once again.  
  
Bracing himself, Ankh drew himself up, shifting to his Greeed form. It concealed the stupid, vulnerable expression he was still holding back. He just wanted to be away from here. Somewhere alone, so he could get rid of the feelings that choked him, the pain that twisted his stomach and made everything /hurt/ in ways he didn’t think medals could feel. But for now, he’d have to push all that down. His desire to run away was also born from hatred, hatred of being so near the King, he thought bitterly.  
  
“Sure, I’ll do all the talking we need, so we won’t be here all night. The negotiation is going to go like this: You give them to me, and I don’t tear out your throat,” he growled.

 

"Hey, hey, hey!" Eiji said, defensively, when Ankh transformed in his Greeed form. He huffed, shaking his head, standing up. He forced Ptera-Tora-Batta, the music and announcement glitching now as it had before, in a matter of moments (as if he was waiting for Ankh to do something like this). He activated the claws on the end of his hands as he swiftly dropped back down to a crouch.

 

"I said I wanted to talk. That means, me, me, me!"

 

And, in retaliation to the form shifting, as well as the growling of the words when his own voice was so lighthearted and carefree, he drove the claws through Gotou's stomach, from behind. At first, Gotou didn't react, but after a few seconds, his eyes widened, and he leaned forward, spitting up blood. He jerked when the claws were pulled roughly out of him, and he groaned loud, slumping off to his side.

 

"He'll live," said Eiji, standing up, as if he hadn't just tried to kill a man he once held in high regard. He pressed his foot onto Gotou's shoulder, rolling the man back and forth while he squirmed on his side and bled and bled and bled. "That is, if you talk with me, Ankh. Just wanna—Ankh—!"

 

Seemingly a moment of weakness, the name had been shouted with clear desperation, as if it was begging, begging to either be released or for help. Eiji clutched at his head, squeezing his eyes beneath the helmet and leaning forward, trembling as the King tried to fight off the control.

 

"Ankh," Eiji said, still hunched over, with the voice distorted almost beyond comprehension. The lights of the eyes ran steady as green, though he still held his head, still looked like he was fighting himself. "He's ly—ng—on't belie—him. Goin—g to kill —ou —oon and other—, —nkh, I—lov—ou."

 

But, the moment ended quickly while Eiji yelled out, pain weaving in and out of his voice, desperation clinging to him that wouldn't go away. The eyes went purple, and he stood up, hands on his hips. He kicked at Gotou again, shoving him all the way on his stomach, pressing down hard against his rib cage. Several cracks could be heard over Gotou's yells. He didn't have much longer, now, and would bleed out very soon.

 

"Ankh, hey, Ankh, just wanna talk. Give me your core medals or I'll kill him." Although his stance was relaxed and playful, literally no emotion touched upon his voice, as if he were a robot.

 

Ankh started forward at the attack, cursing. He was hoping to leave this encounter with both of the humans intact. “Alright, /talk/--” The sudden word made Ankh give pause as well. That didn’t sound like this Eiji. It sounded like… like his Eiji.  
  
“Eiji…” He breathed, taking a step forward. He could barely make out the last words, but they were so familiar that he didn’t need much to figure them out. Things were slowly becoming clearer, he thought. ...Whether or not Eiji couldn’t love a Greeed, he needed help. Ankh could ask him later, the /true/ him. The him that was begging for help. “Eiji, I--!” No, he couldn’t, the King would be back in control now, with those purple eyes, and he would taunt and mock him for such weak, human words.  
  
But Eiji was in there. And it didn’t seem like a trick. It wasn’t the King, or the Eiji that seemed so alien and different. That meant, there was something to save. There was a clearer goal, now, an opponent Ankh felt he could separate and target. He needed to get rid of the medals inside of Eiji, and then… well, then he’d see how it went from there.  
  
Ankh took a deep breath, moving his arms out to his sides, palms up, as though surrendering. “Okay, then talk.” It was impossible to keep a harsh, angry edge from his voice. “Unless it’s about core medals. I’m afraid I need those a little more than you do.” He itched to just reach into Eiji’s chest and tear out the medals here and now, if he was quick enough he could get him off of Gotou before he killed him, too-- But he forced himself to still.   
  
“We’re negotiating, right? If you kill him, you lose leverage to make me do what you want. Then what good does that do for you? You haven’t even said how many of my cores you want. Too vague for an exchange.” Ankh spoke smoothly, but with a bit of a hurried pace. Gotou was running out of time, and unless he did something about it, he’d be bringing back at least one corpse.

 

Compared to Ankh, Eiji took his grand old time in doing anything. He dilly-dallied for a few moments, glancing around the area. No one had come here, and no one would, and they would be alone to die if he just killed all three right now... But where would the fun be in that? So, all of his movements were slow, sluggish, as if thousands of weights were upon him.

 

At his feet, Gotou spit up an astounding amount of blood. He groaned weakly, unable to keep his eyes open any longer. A few times, he had tried to sit up, but his strength had been zapped away extremely fast. So he just could lay there, face in a puddle of his own blood, hair matte with the crimson liquid, sticking to his face. He reached out towards Ankh, though he couldn't bring himself to lift up his arm, so it just lay limply on the ground. The only thing he could think of was, Date-san is going to kill me.

 

Eiji noticed the man's efforts and crouched down again. Roughly and harshly, he yanked Gotou up by the hair. Blood dripped off of him, and he gave a cry of pain, more blood gushing out of his mouth. If he didn't bleed out, he'd choke to death.

 

Eiji hummed, uncharacteristcally gentle as he brushed some hair out of Gotou's face. "It is amazing you are still alive," he mused. "At least you will die slow and painful." He let go of Gotou's hair, letting him drop with a thud. "Happy birthday."

 

And then he stood, wiping the blood on his hands off on the back of his armor, on his thighs. He remembered how Ankh had almost lost his composure when the real Eiji had taken over briefly, and he laughed, quieter than he had been before. "I want all of your medals. I will keep you alive, though, for now, so you can have your main core. In return, I will even help you carry these humans to safety, since you will be much too weak to do it yourself."

 

Even when offering to help, he taunted him. Eight hundred years ago, it had been Ankh who first conspired against him. Although back then he embraced it, now—now, he would get his revenge, and with a proper vessel like Eiji as his host, the same events wouldn't be repeated.

 

Unfortunately, even if Ankh would accept the offer, Eiji froze, looking up and to the side. Every muscle in his body seemed to halt completely, and after a moment, he brought his hand, clenched into a fist, to his chest. "Ah," he breathed. "They're close."

 

Eiji waved over at Ankh. "It seems you lucked out, Ankh. I really regret having to leave you, but..." He switched out Tora for Kujaku, running the scanner over the driver three times this time to force the transformation, apparently harder when none of the medals matched. His wings unfurled and illuminated the entire dark area, and with one final kick to Gotou, he ascended.

 

"Bye-bye, Ankh!" he called, getting further away. "Tomorrow, it will be your birthday!" He disappeared into the cover of the night.

 

Even in his Greeed form, it was difficult carrying two grown men back to the restaurant, especially when one was bleeding to death all over him. But slowly (as slowly as he could afford, with Gotou injured) he was able to bring back the two without either of them dying. So that was a definite victory on his part. And no core medals lost, either.

 

Gotou and Shingo had been taken to the hospital, everyone except Ankh going to worry over them and visit them today. So he was left alone at Cous Coussier, pacing the floor in the main dining area. He needed a plan, a more concrete one, not so impulsive as his last endeavor. The issue was the medals, he was assuming, so removing them was the best first step. But how? He tried to weigh his own power against that of OOOs-- against the purple medals…

 

If he could get close to Eiji… Turn the very tactic that had been used on him back on the King somehow… Then, if close enough, he could take the medals without having to knock Eiji around first.

 

Ankh paused in his pacing when the doors opened. A familiar set of presences were on the threshold of the restaurant, and Ankh’s eyes narrowed when he laid eyes on them. He drew himself up, taking a step back. “The restaurant is closed,” he said coolly. “And I’m not in the mood to fight over medals.” Not that that would really stop his fellow Greeed if that was their intent.

 

Uva didn’t help Ankh’s impression of the reason for their visit by barging in with a harsh yell of “Ankh!” He did pause a fair distance from the bird Greeed, though, his hands curling into fists. “We don’t have time for your stupid banter.”

 


	8. Chapter 8

Out of all the Greeed that entered the restaurant, the group notably lacking Maki, Gamel seemed to be the only one smiling. "Ankh!" he called, happily, contrasting to Uva's harsh yell. Yet, he did not move next to Ankh, urged on by Mezul's orders to stay put.

 

Kazari shut the restaurant door behind him, and he locked the door. He turned to the room, standing next to the three companions, with Ankh facing them. After a minute, he took a step forward, hand outstretched, other at his side to show he was unarmed.

 

"We'll defeat the King. We'll help you," he said, matter-of-factly.

 

"Yes," Mezul chimed in. "Before we get weaker. He has most of our cores."

 

"And," Kazari said, eyes downcast and away--like, for once, he didn't know what to do, "they're breaking. At an alarming rate. Surely, you must've felt one or two of yours break."

 

Ankh eyed Kazari’s hand suspiciously. So, the King had gotten to the others, now. He glanced around at the other Greeed, frowning. He didn’t make any move forward, keeping on his guard. As far as he knew, they could be lying, working with the King, already planning to turn on him. It was in their nature.

 

“Breaking?” He glanced down at his own body, perplexed. “No, none of mine have broken.” The cores separated from him felt very, very faint, but they certainly weren’t broken. It had to be the purple medals, though. Every time Eiji had used one of those unnatural combos, he could feel the strain on his own cores when they were involved.

 

But if they truly were breaking, then that would certainly be a motivator for the Greeed to agree to aid him. He raised an eyebrow, looking almost amused, if a little hollowly. “I never thought I’d see you guys asking /me/ for help again.” Looking at the four Greeed in turn, Ankh crossed his arms.

 

“Where’s Maki?” The doctor seemed to be the leader of the Greeed now, and if they were here without him, either he was in hiding somewhere, the Greeed had decided to turn on him, or…

 

Kazari dropped his hand, raising it up instead in a shrug. "Yes. Breaking," he said, but nothing more. He just smiled a wicked smile, falling back in line with the other three Greeed.

 

Mezul sighed. "So... even when he hates you, the King cannot fully kill you," she mused, irritated, turning away and twirling her hair around a finger. Gamel watched her curiously, smiling all the while.

 

At the mention of Doctor Maki, however, they froze. Kazari clicked his tongue, and let out a low, short laugh. None of them looked at one another--besides Gamel, who looked between Ankh and Mezul.

 

"The puppet man is dead, isn't he, Mezul?"

 

She groaned and nodded. "Yes, that's correct, Gamel."

 

"The King came for him last night," Kazari said, a little quiet, with the smile wiped from his face. "The good news is, some of his medals were broken."

 

"The bad news," continued Mezul, "is that he now has seven whole medals, compared to our meager three or four."

 

Ankh glanced away with a slightly awkward scowl at Mezul’s words. He didn’t enjoy any reminder of his unique relationship to the King. He would’ve preferred to separate himself from that man, make his loathing of him completely clear.  
  
He’d hit some kind of nerve with the mention of Maki. Ankh looked between the silent Greeed, an eyebrow raised, until his eyes landed on Gamel, who spoke. Ah. Kazari filled in the rest of the explanation, and Ankh’s brow furrowed. “That’s going to be a little harder to pull off,” he said, trying to sound casual, although he felt an unpleasant feeling in his stomach. He worried, about Eiji.  
  
Speaking of Eiji, Ankh almost asked if he had seemed to be alright, before realizing how foolish that would sound. “What was the state of E-- his host?” He paused, before adding more to make his cover more concrete. “We’ll need to know any weaknesses to get those medals out of him.” And that was the plan, this was something Ankh would not budge on, should any of the Greeed ask.  
  
“What? Aren’t we just going to kill him? OOOs doesn’t matter, he’s just some human.” And sure enough, there was Uva with a protest. Ankh turned a rather sharp glare on him. He wanted to make the bug take it back, because Eiji /did/ matter, he mattered more than these damn medals and the King and every one of the Greeed.  
  
But instead, Ankh just glared at him. “We’re removing the medals and destroying them. If you guys don’t like it, you can leave, and I’ll just do it myself.” He looked around at his old comrades again, as if daring any of them to point out the flaws in his plan. “Got it?”

 

Kazari noticed the shift in how Ankh talked, especially when thy brought up killing OOOs, killing the human boy that Ankh so obviously cared for. If he didn't need to work with the other Greeed, he would've taunted him. Instead, he just laughed a little, keeping his eyes low and away.

 

Mezul, however, had something else to offer. She still played with her hair, not looking at Ankh as she spoke. "And? If that fails?" she asked.

 

"Yeah," Gamel said, with an innocent smile. "What happens if that fails, Ankh?"

 

"Hooh?" Kazari really tried. He really did try. He looked up, making eye contact with Ankh, crossing his arms over his chest. "Don't you guys know? If Ankh's plan fails..." He laughed, shaking his head, pointing a finger accusingly at Ankh. "No. Even you wouldn't be so stupid... Right, Ankh?"

 

"Mezul," said Gamel, a little quietly, standing behind the other Greeed, "what's he talking about?"

 

Mezul just clicked her tongue, shaking her head. "He means, if retrieving the medals fails, Ankh will falter and won't be able to kill the host. Which does seem likely. We should have a back up plan for one of us to go in."

 

Ankh bristled, sending another glare Mezul’s way now. “It won’t fail,” he said stiffly. He wouldn’t let it fail, there was no other option. He almost sent a half-hearted glare in Gamel’s direction, but decided instead to direct a nastier one at Kazari.  
  
“/If/ it fails, which it /won’t/,” he hissed through gritted teeth. “I’ll-- I’ll be able to do it.” If it had to be done… Although Ankh rejected the idea violently, if it /had/ to be done, he wanted to do it. He didn’t want anyone else to strike the fatal blow on the King-- on Eiji. “I’m not stupid, I know what needs to be done. I’ll kill him. If it comes to that.”  
  
Ankh glanced away, hating how weak he had to look to them. A proud Greeed like him, unable to bear the thought of killing some insignificant human.  
  
Uva, who had been silent, confused as well, spoke up again. “And how do we know you’ll do that?” Then, directed to the other Greeed, “What if he betrays us again? He could be working with the King, he could’ve even planned to host him in OOOs from the start--”  
  
Ankh’s clawed arm grasped Uva’s collar, yanking him closer to the bird Greeed. “I would /never/ work with that man again,” he spat. He couldn’t exactly admit that it was Uva’s last words that had offended him most. “I’ll kill him, alright? I won’t falter.” Ankh’s temper, normally already on a short fuse, was more than a little frayed, the Greeed more on edge than he wanted anyone to see. He was doing a poor job of concealing it at the moment, though.

 

Kazari let out a low laugh at Ankh's reaction. "Predictable," was all he said. He waved a hand, pacing a few steps and shrugging his shoulders. "But, I'll be watching, Ankh. Make sure you can take him down," he warned, stopping in his tracks to glare at Ankh from under his hat before ducking out of the restaurant.

 

Mezul sighed. "We'll all be watching you, Ankh." None of them were friends, really (Gamel excluded), none of them comrades except in arms. It was easy to see that none of them trusted one another. Mezul finally dropped her hand from her hair, the lock she had been playing with now sufficiently curly. She bit her lip, then shook her head, and she left without another word.

 

Gamel looked between Ankh and where Mezul had left, with a confused expression and eyebrows drawn. Then, a smile overcame his features, directed at Ankh. "You can do it," he encouraged, then he hurried after Mezul, calling her name.  


	9. Chapter 9

Hina was used to Ankh never helping around the restaurant. Although Eiji (she couldn't stop thinking about him) had always wanted to help, Ankh always just stood around doing nothing. At least, she thought to herself as she finished cleaning the counters, he would come out and join us back then.

 

She increasingly worried over the Greeed ever since Eiji's betrayal. He had shut himself out, and they didn't talk about it ever. Shingo would tell her about everything Ankh had felt, and it made her feel awful. Luckily he had gotten his medals, and so her brother needn't be put in harms way any more... But she admitted, she very rarely saw him as taking on any other form besides the one in her brother's image.

 

Especially ever since that night Ankh brought Shingo and Gotou-san back.

 

Shingo was still in the hospital, and she was thankful his injuries weren't as bad as Gotou-san's were. Visiting hours were over, and she would go in the morning before class anyway. So, as Chiyoko said good night to her and left, leaving Hina alone in the restaurant by herself, she found herself with nothing to do. She finished cleaning, and her sense of worry got the best of her.

 

Hina slowly approached the back door, as if it was a bomb set to go off at any moment. She pressed her ear against the door, and hearing nothing, she cracked it open. A cold breeze hit her face, making her realize the window was open, and Ankh had probably left for the roof. She took a step inside, crossing the room to close the window.

 

When she turned, however, she paused. The familiar red blanket and been pulled from Ankh's perch and placed on Eiji's bed, where lumps popped up every now and then. She listened, and breathing, not hers, became apparent. Leaning over, she carefully raised an edge of the blanket, a few of Eiji's scarves falling to the floor, and a gasp followed.

 

"... Ankh? Are you under there?"

 

Ankh was glad that no one bothered him, everyone taking his loud and aggressive hints that he wanted to be left alone, spared the pity and sympathy. It just made him feel worse to see the others give him such pitying looks. He was alone in the back room now, and hardly a soul besides himself ever went in there. He hated it, surprised at how empty the room felt without Eiji there, almost oppressively so.

 

He slept earlier now, too. There wasn’t much else to do. So between planning their next course of action and any other small obligations, Ankh slept, although he didn’t need it, and it often just ended with nightmares.

 

One reason that he was glad for the isolation was that no one would be able to see anything like this. Ankh’s perch felt too hard, too cold. He’d tried sleeping in Eiji’s bed, but the emptiness of it kept him from sleep. So he’d made a nest, of sorts, pulling all the blankets in the room and Eiji’s clothes onto the bed. It was warm, although he could never quite get warm enough, and the whole haphazard nest of clothing and blankets smelled like Eiji.

 

It was pretty pathetic, he realized, but… it was also comforting. So, with a pillow nestled against his side, Ankh dozed in the bed, just on the edge of sleep.

 

That is, until he heard a voice. Slightly muffled, from both the blankets and his own hearing. He’d assumed he was the only person in the restaurant by now. Or was it earlier than he’d thought? Ankh stiffened, keeping his back turned to Hina. Maybe he could pretend to be asleep, or pretend he wasn’t there. She might try to take apart the nest if she thought he wasn’t there, though. Or she’d just find him anyways. He was hard to miss now, with a full body of his own.

 

But he kept his back to her anyways, curling around the pillow. “What do you want?” He muttered, voice low and apathetic.

 

It was... a sad sight.

 

Her own grief caused by Eiji's betrayal pushed aside, Hina sighed. Sympathy outweighed all the cons that could possibly be caused by staying in here and moving aside the blanket to at least show the tops of his hair. She stood up, debating for a moment, then sat on the edge of the bed, careful not to disturb any real changes in the nest or accidentally sit on Ankh.

 

"I... just wanted to check on you," she offered as an explanation, weakly, voice quiet and low. She folded her hands in her lap and stared at them.

 

Hina, really, didn't know what to do. Ankh wasn't human, but he was close enough, and it was clear he was experiencing human emotions about all this. She just didn't know how to go about comforting him, when he had the face of her brother and the temper of a lion.

 

"Eiji-kun... will come back," she finally said, after a long, long silence. "If anyone can bring Eiji-kun back, you can do it, Ankh." She reached out a hand, guessed on where Ankh's shoulder was (she was right), and squeezed it gingerly. "I promise."

 

And, she stood up again, crossing the room. Standing with her back to him, in the doorway, she flicked off the lights. "Good night, Ankh," she said, then shut the door behind herself.

 

Ankh didn’t respond, didn’t look at her. He wanted her words to be comforting, and they were, a little, but they also just reminded him of the alternative, should he fail. He wondered who’d hate him more if he killed Eiji, Hina or himself. It would be deserved, of course. But he still wasn’t thinking about killing him as an actual part of the plan. It was an abstract idea, easily ignored with the stubborn assertion that it wouldn’t be needed, that there would be a way to get the medals out.

 

There had to be.


	10. Chapter 10

The state of limbo Ankh had found himself in had ended. Planning and waiting was over, now all he could do was act. And he tried not to betray the fear he felt at this.

 

He was very quiet, approaching the rocky site overlooking a beach slowly and carefully. The other Greeed were surrounding the area, hidden for now. Ankh’s plan didn’t call for them yet. Hopefully, they wouldn’t even have to play that large a role, if the plan went smoothly. He had struggled to think of how to best approach Eiji, how to make the King let his guard down long enough to be restrained. Hopefully, what he was about to do would turn out to not be as stupid and reckless as Kazari had complained it was.

 

Ankh saw the figure as he approached, although not quite what he was doing. “Eiji!” He called, drawing closer--in his human form, for the moment--and fixing a blank look to his face. Before the man could react, he allowed his expression to become pained. It wasn’t very hard to fake, certainly. He dropped to his knees, ignoring how the rocky terrain cut into his skin at the impact. Extending his hand--curled into a fist--to Eiji, he uncurled his fingers to reveal a single red medal resting in his palm. Ankh sucked in a deep breath, steeling himself. He really couldn’t feel more pathetic than he already did, this should’ve been easy. He dropped his head, as though in defeat.

 

“I’m going to give you my medals,” he said. “I…” A pause, and Ankh shivered. “I… don’t know what I’d do, if I lost you.” He made sure his voice sounded just harsh enough, not uncharacteristically soft enough to raise suspicion. But at the same time, he wanted to look vulnerable.

 

“You want them, don’t you? I just… want to be with you. As a bunch of medals,” his voice caught on his next sentence, the words genuinely painful to say. “As a bunch of medals, I can be close to you. You can even have the main one. That’s... what I desire.”

 

Eiji--no, the King, by this point--had been a little disappointed. Most of the core medals he had had broken, and he was down to just a few. In fact, he could only make two full combos, the red and the purple, and he wanted to use neither of them most of the time. Fortunately for him, though, or unfortunately, the Greeed had stopped creating Yummies for whatever reason, so there was little reason to fight anyway.

 

He stayed and waited, though. There'd be another chance to overthrow him. They'd definitely try and take it, and destroy him once and for all now. Before, he would welcome their desire--but now, all he wanted to do was make them feel like they were as empty as he was. But if they all came at once, that'd make it easier for him.

 

Eiji stood at the very edge of the cliff. The ground would shift occasionally underneath him, as if the cliff was getting ready to break and fall off at any moment. He wondered idly if that should happen, when he felt a group of familiar presences, and heard his name called out.

 

He glanced over his shoulder before turning around to face Ankh fully on. The smile overcame as his face immediately, even as Ankh fell to the ground in seeming pain (perhaps it even grew). He took several steps away from the edge of the cliff, holding onto the scarf around his neck so it didn't blow away in the wind.

 

"Ankh?" Eiji said, in a much more Eiji manner than kingly. He halted his steps at the proposition, and his face patterned into one of confusion. He tilted his head and thought for a moment, then he smiled once more, even warmer and more inviting than before. His steps towards Ankh were slow and measured, taking his grand old time, before he finally reached the Greeed. The King crouched down, placing one hand on Ankh's shoulder (perhaps squeezing a bit too tightly) while the other hand snatched the red medal out of Ankh's grasp.

 

"Wonderful!" he said, at last. "I do want your medals. I want to be close with you, Ankh. Forever. Eiji-kun does, too," he added, and even though he spoke as the King, he sounded more like Eiji. His voice dropped really low, so that only Ankh, and not the other Greeed, could hear. "Your desire is the desire I want to destroy the most. Do not tell the others here that." Eiji spoke lovingly, though his face had twisted into one with mock sincerity, a smirk of condescension, and his eyes held that bright, bright purple tint to them.

 

Ankh had to suppress the urge to recoil at the feeling of the medals so close to him, instead leaning into the King's touch, as though longing. He stiffened a little, though, at his next words. Perhaps it had been too much to hope that he wouldn't notice the other Greeed. But he could work around it.

 

He caught Eiji's hand in his as he took the medal from Ankh, hesitantly. "I can be useful to you, even if I am only a pile of medals," he murmured. "They think I'm going to help them." Ankh's tone was similarly quiet, but light, and the traces of a smile pulled at his lips, as though he were letting the King in on a secret. "I'm supposed to distract you, so they can kill you. When I give the signal, they'll come from behind and either side of us." He lied easily, laying out the fabricated plan as elaborately as he would a real one.

 

"I said I would help kill you, but..." He squeezed the man's hand, looking at him now with a desperate, longing expression, eyes steely. "I don't want him taken away from me. Please. Even if there are only remnants of him..."

 

For once, he hoped that the King had seen and remembered time the Greeed and Eiji spent together. It could lend to Ankh's act. He leaned closer, not moving his other hand, his right hand, into position quite yet. If he could just get a /little/ closer, make sure that the King believed that he spoke the truth, at least a little.

 

The threads of truth in his words also made his cores ache with genuine longing, if the King were to sense it. "My desire could help you destroy many, many more, even if you spare it just temporarily."

 

A bemused expression replaced his ugly one. This was turning out entirely too much like the scene from eight hundred years ago. Ankh seemed to be well aware that if he were to work with the King once more, he'd disappear--that's what he seemed to imply, anyway. Taking his main core would bring the King much delight--and if he were to absorb it along with the purple core, he and this stupid human could be together forever.

 

He squeezed Ankh's hand back. "Wonderful!" he shout-whispered. "Splendid, Ankh. You truly do have the biggest desire. We can replay that scene from so, so long ago. Do you remember your lines, Ankh? Happy birthday!"

 

And, for Ankh's sake, after feeling that delectable longing emanating from Ankh's cores, he put on that fake Eiji smile, dimples and all, and leaned forward, pressing a small kiss to Ankh's cheek. Taking on a different tone, full-Eiji, he whispered, "I love you, Ankh." The King wondered idly whether or not Ankh knew this was an act. He probably did, the King decided, but it didn't matter to him, did it?

 

He released Ankh's hand, pulling away a little. "What is the plan, Ankh? Show me your desire and thoughts," he whispered. "Hurry, or they might get a little suspicious. Kazari may be weaker, but he is not a fool."

 

Ankh concealed a grimace, dropping his head again to stare at the ground instead. He loathed playing along like this, remembering the time the King mentioned. But it looked like it was working, so he didn’t move, didn’t glare or recoil or reject the words. He just nodded.

 

At the kiss, and the familiar phrase, Ankh gave pause. It really did sound like Eiji, and if he didn’t know better, he would think it to be Eiji himself. Knowing it wasn’t made him feel a little sick in the pit of his stomach. But Ankh leaned into him regardless, shutting his eyes and breathing a sigh. “I-- love you too.” He didn’t want to say that like this. He didn’t want the King to hear such a private, intimate confession, and his voice caught while saying it, as though he’d rather choke back the words.

 

But at least, it seemed as though his act had worked. He hoped, at least, that the King believed him to be chasing his desire so hungrily that he’d turn traitor again. He was a Greeed, it wasn’t hard to fake wanting, and most of this wasn’t even fake. But the affection was more difficult to control. If he was too soft, it would raise suspicion.

 

He cursed internally when the King pulled away a little, and moved forward to close the distance again. “When I signal them, I’m supposed to say that I’ll never leave you. “We can turn the attack on them, together,” he spoke quietly. He would have to be very quick. “Once I say it, you should use those medals, the purple ones, and transform. Then, we’ll destroy their medals.”

 

The medals were inside Eiji, if Ankh could just get them to come out… he could grab them before they got into the belt, then he’d be down to four medals. From there, should that succeed, the rest of the Greeed truly would make an appearance, restrain Eiji long enough for Ankh to possess him. He looked at the King, eyes determined, gaze fierce. “I won’t let them hurt him.” And that wasn’t a lie. Then, raising his voice, Ankh continued. “...I’ll never leave you.”

 

Ankh had moved in closer when he moved away, and the King took pity on him. The poor Greeed couldn't help it, he supposed. He had possessed that human for far too long, and now he was paying the price with these ugly human emotions. The King fondly looked back on these emotions, though he could do without them now.

 

So, the King wrapped an arm around him, giving his shoulders a quick squeeze. "It will be okay, Ankh," he murmured, a lot like Eiji, but with a weird tone on the edge, on the name. "You and I will work together. And we can win. Then we can be together forever."

 

He drew away, then, and nodded at the instructions. Using the purple medals, his own medals, was somewhat of a hassle, but they were the only ones that hadn't broken yet, save for the red medals, which he couldn't bring himself to use. He didn't know why, but he never thought about it. As Ankh spoke, the King stood up.

 

"I have hurt him enough," he said. "You can go back to being the King's servant, soon."

 

On the agreed word, he grabbed the scanner, and three of the medals shot out of him...

 

Ankh wanted to breathe a huge sigh of relief then and there, but instead, he just gave a nod, looking at the King with the most lovesick expression he could muster. It was working. It was working and he was almost dizzy with relief that it was. Despite all of the time he’d spent justifying the plan and selling the other Greeed on it, he had still found himself unsure of whether it would work himself.

 

He stayed quite still as the King stood, looking as though he wouldn’t move, but when the medals shot out, he pushed himself to his feet with surprising speed. He didn’t waste any time, grabbing the purple medals out of the air and holding them tightly in both of his hands. Backing away, he gave a yell of, “Now!”

 

This prompted the other Greeed to emerge, running at the King with the intent to grab and restrain him. Ankh stumbled a little, feeling the medals burn into his hands. They /hurt/ to touch, feeling like they would freeze his hands solid with how cold they were. He almost let go of them in surprise, but instead he fumbled with one pained hand to pull a small box from his jacket. The medals didn’t seem to /want/ to be in his hands, either, tugging in the direction of Eiji and forcing Ankh to keep a tighter grip on them.

 

Fumbling still, he tried to force the medals into the box quickly. “Ankh!” Mezul called as she and Gamel moved to try and grab Eiji’s arms, now close enough to do so with Mezul on one side and Gamel on the other. “Hurry up!”

 

“I’m trying!” He hissed back, finally shutting the lid of the wooden box on the rebellious medals.

 

Eiji let out a shriek of pain as the medals left him -- and didn't enter the driver. They were in Ankh's hands, and that hurt /him/. He struggled violently, managing to shake Mezul off, but Gamel still, unsurprisingly, held on. His face now only resembled Eiji in nothing more than features, twisted into both scorn, contempt, and pain.

 

"Ankh!" he yelled, then quieter, as the box's lid closed, and Ankh had stopped touching his medals, "You..."

 

The struggling stopped, and Eiji sank to his knees, then curled forward. Gamel tentatively let him go, only when Mezul said it was alright. Uva, who had been watching, and waiting to see if he needed to back them up, took a few steps forward, while Mezul and Gamel took a step backward, away from the semi-limp body.

 

Only the sound of Eiji's rough breathing, signaling he was still alive, filled the surrounding area.

 

That is, until Eiji sat up, clapped his hands together, and yelled, "Wonderful! Amazing! Everyone did their lines!"

 

In the confusion, Kazari snagged the box off of Ankh, then transformed into his Greeed form. While Gamel and Mezul looked on in question, Uva was the quickest to the punch. "Kazari--!"

 

But it was too late. Eiji had three more purple medals in the diver and transformed in little to no time. His hand was at Uva's throat in an instant, and Kazari, still with the box in hand, shoved a claw through Uva's midsection, behind him. Uva tried to choke something out, but it was lost, as the sound of the core medals shattering resounded in the area, and he disintegrated into nothing more than medals.

 

"Happy birthday, Uva!" yelled the king.

 

"Happy birthday," said Kazari.

 

Ankh hardly had time to react before the box was in Kazari’s hands. His eyes widened in surprise, but he quickly recovered, transforming into his Greeed form as well and curling his hand into a fist.

 

He started backward in surprise at how quickly Uva was shattered into medals, and Mezul and Gamel seemed similarly shocked. Mezul caught Ankh’s eye, giving a meaningful nod towards Eiji. “Ankh, we have to--”

 

“/No/,” Ankh snapped, bristling at the implication. “The plan can still work.” His mind raced, searching for something, anything. Everything had ridden on this, and Ankh had been a stupid, /stupid/ idiot, assuming that Kazari feared oblivion too much to think about allying himself with the King. “He only has one medal in his body right now, if we get the ones in the belt and--”

 

Mezul gave a frustrated sigh, gesturing for Gamel to follow her so they could draw closer to Ankh, rather than the King and Kazari. “/Ankh/, I’m not going to be destroyed because you can’t kill one human! We’ll do it, if you can’t!”

 

Ankh tried to calm the strange panic in his chest. “Just hold on! I’ll-- I’ll think of something.” If they got the medals from the belt, he’d only have one left. Ankh clung to this, trying to make something of it. It would be impossible to get close to the King again of the King’s volition--had he really humiliated himself like that for /nothing/?--so force would be the only way.

 

He took a step forward, and he would’ve scowled if he was able to. “Kazari! Are you stupid or something? There’s no way you can trust him to let you live! And believe me, I speak from experience!” He growled, looking as though he were ready to attack the cat Greeed then and there.

 

The King and Kazari allowed the others to regroup, both fully confident over their own abilities. Although Eiji stayed transformed, he did walk closer to the cliff face, looking down at the beach and the water that went on for miles beneath. He held out a hand, sweeping it across the land, as if he was motioning to all that was his.

 

Kazari watched the others, though, and he seemed to bristle at Ankh's words, once he had taken a step forward. "What do you know?" he yelled back, waving a hand around, picking out a stray cell medal from in between his claws. He tossed it to the ground, clicking his tongue.

 

"You don't know why I've allied myself with him, Ankh," he said, eyeing all three suspiciously. "I know he's going to kill me. I'm not as stupid as you take me to be." If he could've smiled, he would've.

 

"Enough talk! Kazari! Please!" The King pivoted on his heels, and as he did so, he threw the axe--it landed straight in Gamel's chest, plowing through him, and sticking into the ground somewhere behind him.

 

Gamel cried out, in pain, then with a single word: "Mezul...!" He fell to his knees, and the gaping hole in his chest sparked, as the core cracked. He reached out for Mezul until he also dissolved into medals, just as Uva had. Mezul gasped, taking a step away, before turning to Kazari and Eiji.

 

"Enough!" she shrieked. "Enough, enough! Stop this!" She seemed fearful, now, especially, and she took several steps back, holding her hands in front of her chest, clenched into fists. "Please... I'll go with you! Just, Just spare--"

 

"Happy birthday, Mezul!" the King shouted, and using the power of the Ptera, froze the ground Mezul walked on. Kazari jumped in at that point, skidding on the ice, and gaining enough speed to slash right through her, ending her in a way similar to Uva's. The medals clanked to the ground around his feet.

 

"Wonderful! Amazing!" said the King, clapping his hands together again. He turned his attention towards Ankh, then. "You - are - next!" He punctuated each word with a clap, and he took several steps forward. Kazari walked closely near him once Eiji had reached a certain point, and then--

 

The King's hand shot out to grip Kazari's neck. "Happy birthday, Kazari! Congratulations!" His claws gripped into the Greeed's neck, spilling a few medals out. Kazari clawed at Eiji's armored hands, trying to force them away, to no avail.

 

"Wh... What?!"

 

"Ankh, you were right," the King said, eyes only on Kazari, hoisting him off the ground easily. "Kazari was right too. He wanted more power -- more and more power to destroy the world with! What a wonderful desire! Too great of a desire to let it continue on any longer."

 

A fearful noise caught in Kazari's throat, and he clawed harder. It wasn't supposed to end like this... He had predicted his death, but at least later on, after Ankh was dead -- he didn't want Ankh to see him so pathetic! Unfortunately for Kazari, the King reached in with his free hand, yanked the core medal from Kazari, and watched as the medals fell to the ground. He held the medal up in front of his face and ... snapped it cleanly in two.

 

"Congratulations, Ankh! You are the last one standing!"

 

Ankh couldn’t help the growing fear and sick feeling that grew in him. Of course, the Greeed had never /liked/ each other by any means, but it still felt wrong to watch them cut down so coldly, so cleanly like this.

 

When he thought it was his turn, he felt frozen by fear. No, he shouldn’t be afraid, this was pathetic. He needed to run, or fight, or do /anything/. But he didn’t need to, because as he had predicted, Kazari turned out to be the next one on the chopping block. It didn’t help his panic any, though.

 

With every broken medal, Ankh tensed more, mind fighting between two goals. The still reasonable part of his mind tried to remind him of Eiji, of the medals, of the box Kazari had held sitting buried under the pile of cell medals that had once been Kazari. The rest of his mind panicked, urging him to run away. And he almost did, honestly.

 

But… Eiji. He was in there. If Ankh let himself get killed, all of this--planned out because Ankh /refused/ to lose him--would have been for nothing. A Greeed was supposed to pursue what they wanted no matter what, go out kicking and fighting and clawing for as much of their desire as they could grasp. It was the least Ankh could do to make a better effort than standing there like a terrified fool.

 

“... So I see,” he managed to get out after a moment of stunned silence. “I guess… You’re going to kill me too, then?” Ankh had no idea what he was doing. Stalling for time? For what purpose? He took a couple careful steps backward, his entire body tense. “Then what? Will you take the rest of the world’s desire? That’s a lot of desire to destroy for a mere man.” Another step backward.

 

If he knocked him out of the transformation, would that force the medals out for a moment again? Could he get the King away from the pile of medals long enough to grab the box? Ankh’s mind raced as he backed away very slowly.

 

The King watched as Ankh took several steps away, moved so slowly. He didn't attack him, no. He stayed in one place, just watching Ankh with a tilt of the head. Ankh looked as if he still wanted to fight, but had his tail between his legs. It was... delightful, to see him so scared.

 

He smiled beneath the helmet.

 

"Ankh, where are you going?" he called to him. "You are not... running away, are you?" It was a taunt in nothing but the words said, sounding so innocent, so, so carefree and loving when he spoke. He beckoned to him with an oustretched hand, then shook his head. "Do you not want to join me, Ankh? Why do you think I have left you for last?"

 

He glanced down at his feet, at the pile of cell medals that used to make up Kazrari. What a pitiful Greeed, who had practically sought him out to beg for his life. How disgusting, that desire to live. The King crouched down and picked up the box. He felt his medals resonate within the box, shaking it a little, but he did not open. He tossed the box closer to Ankh, then began to take a few steps back.

 

"That is what you want, right, Ankh? I will let you have them." He didn't need them, anyway. He still had all the rest of his cores, plus Ankh's unused ones.

 

Eiji moved even slower than Ankh had been, never taking his eyes off of the other. He reached the edge of the cliff, small pebbles falling down as he stepped on them. The edge still felt wobbly, like it was ready to break at any moment. He would survive the fall in this form, no doubt.

 

He canceled the transformation, one of the three medals returning to his body. He sent two of them flying, further than Ankh, over his head, and they landed on the rocky surface. He spread his arms to his sides, as if he were about to be crucified.

 

"Or do you want him, more? Hey, Ankh?"

 

And, the cliff broke. Eiji closed his eyes, tilting backwards, before ultimately falling out of sight.

 

Ankh’s gaze followed the box like a hawk. He halted his retreat, instead moving forwards to crouch and pick up the box himself. The first thing that took his attention off the box was the fact that the King had canceled the transformation. The second was the crumbling cliff. And the third, which took his attention from all of those things, was the medals flying far past him.  
  
He was about to go for the medals, when he realized what the King was doing. His head snapped back to the cliff, to Eiji’s body falling over the edge. As though his body moved of its own accord, Ankh felt himself dash for the edge of the cliff as the box dropped from his hand, his wings unfolding as he jumped off the edge.  
  
Taking a rather steep dive, Ankh went after the falling man. If he was transformed, Ankh wouldn’t have worried, but he wasn’t, merely a fragile human right now. It felt like he was being mocked, toyed with.   
  
But Ankh didn’t think about that right now, reaching out when he got close enough to grab Eiji’s arms. He faltered a little at the extra strain on his wings, but flapped harder, pulling the man up to hold him more securely.  
  
Ankh sped towards the ground much faster than he would on his own, with the extra weight throwing him off. Having realized this, Ankh shifted so that he’d hit the ground first, wrapping his arms around Eiji, and wrapping his wings around the both of them. He was much more durable, and at this distance from the beach below at this point, the impact wouldn’t be too bad.  
  
So, landing was less a graceful affair and more of a painful impact of tangled limbs. Ankh hissed in pain as he lay back in the sand, taking a second to gather himself. The rather distracting series of events had wiped from his mind, for this short moment, the King. He just knew that he was still there, and Eiji’s body--which he had released from his embrace by this point--was still in one piece. And that was enough of a relief for him.

 

As they landed, Eiji--out of instinct or otherwise--held onto Ankh's feathers tight. He only let go once Ankh did, and once he had been released, he rolled over, eyes shut tight. He lay there for a moment, with his back to Ankh, before slowly pushing himself up onto his hands and knees.

 

"... Ankh...?" he said, quietly, blinking his eyes a few times and looking around. When Eiji's eyes fell on the Greeed, he scrambled over to him, a look of worry crossing his face. "Ankh! Are you alright?" He peered deep into wherever Ankh saw out from. His fingers tangled in the feathers again, desperately, as if he were trying to shake Ankh.

 

But, the moment shattered. Regardless of whether or not Ankh got up to move or reached out to him in any way, Eiji's sincere confusion was replaced by a smirk, a look of disgust drawing in his brows. He let go of Ankh's feathers and pushed himself to his feet, taking a few steps back, and with a snap of his fingers, the purple medals he had lost hovered around him, spinning in a slow circle (as if to taunt) before injecting themselves back into his body.

 

"Ankh, Ankh, you care so much for this boy, right?" the King laughed. "I am not so stupid as to kill the Container of OOO. I failed the last time because I was not correct. But Eiji Hino... Wonderful!" He clapped his hands together, taking a few more steps back, towards the water, and inserted three of the purple medals.

 

He still didn't want to use the red medals, though he should have.

 

The transformation complete, he held up the axe, waiting to see who would strike first.

 

He heard Eiji’s voice at first, what sounded like /Eiji/. Ankh opened his eyes, wincing at the ache from the impact. “Eiji...” He mumbled, starting to push himself up. “I’m fine, are you­­?” But the look on Eiji’s face had changed, back to the uncharacteristic expressions of the King. Ankh’s hands curled into fists as he pushed himself to his feet, only a little shaken from the fall.

 

“And what if I do?" He spat defensively. "Isn't that what Greeed are supposed to do? Want things without end? It just so happens that I want /him/." He stepped forward, steeling himself as he raised a hand, letting flames lick up his arm.

 

He didn't want to hurt Eiji, but at this point, it seemed as though the medals weren't leaving without a fight. So for Eiji's sake, he would have to rough him up a little.

 

Ankh took a deep breath, curling his fingers into a fist as fire concentrated itself there. "He's... he's what I want. And I'm not going to let you take him away from me. I'm not going to let you take /anything/ away from me again. So, I'm going to get those medals out if I have to rip them out by my own hand!"

 

And with that threat, Ankh dashed for the armored man, releasing a ball of fire in the direction of his feet, his arm stretched back to land a hit on the King.

 

"Wonderful!" The single word echoed around them, bouncing off the cliff and the various pillars of rock in the water next to them. It grew fainter and fainter until it disappeared, right as Ankh threw the punch. The King jumped back, away from the flames that threatened to bite at his ankles. His heels dug into the sand, but he faltered, and wasn't quick enough to dodge the actual punch Ankh threw.

 

"Ghk-!" The hit landed squarely in his chest, and his heels dug in even more. The force of the punch shoved him back a little, and he almost dropped the axe--almost, that is. Another punch that landed shoved his heels further back, and he had had enough.

 

He raised the axe above his head with both of his hands, swinging it down. He didn't care if it really did any damage or not--he mostly used the leverage, resting it against Ankh, to push himself away, using the wings on his back to give him even more space between them.

 

"I truly feel your love, Ankh!" he called out to him, gritting his teeth. "I want to destroy it... I will destroy this body if I have to destroy you." He slipped a few cell medals into the axe, gulped it down, and raised it above his head again. "Ha--!"

 

The axe fell from his hands, sticking out in the sand. His clawed hands went to grip his head, leaning forward, with his head bowed. He growled like an animal, loud and frightening, threatening. He scratched at the helmet, as if he were trying to get it off.

 

"Stop it! Stop it! Stop stop stop stop!" he shrieked, and with a burst of energy radiating off of him: "I - am - in - con - trol!" He growled again -- though now, it seemed more like a roar then anything. The King---Eiji?---pulled his hands down to his side, emanating more energy bursts in waves.

 

With a shaky hand, as if it was being forced, he grabbed the scanner at his side. The eyes flickered back and forth, from purple to green and back again, and they settled on green long enough to stop the hand, dropping the scanner.

 

"Ankh!" It was Eiji, clearly so, though his voice was strained. "I can't... I can't hold him back much longer, Ankh." He sounded almost sad, disappointed in himself. "If you... If you kill me, Ankh... then--!"

 

The eyes went back to purple, and he crouched to reach the scanner again, flipping it over in his hand. "Tch! Go back to where you came from, sewer rat!" He went to scan it, but---

 

The hand stopped after it scanned the first medal on the driver, and the familiar, comforting green returned. "Ankh, please! I love you---so please---just---kill---me---aaugh!"

 

The purple won out again---though, peculiarly, patches of the eyes remained green, as if it was a screen that had gone bad. Every move seemed especially forced, now, and as if two people were trying to control one body. Only animalistic roars and growls escaped his mouth now, save for the one or two spare "Ankh"s every now and then.

 

He dropped the scanner after a moment of internal fighting, and willing his feet to move, trudged away from the fight. He didn't want to -- no, he /did/, he did want to destroy Ankh -- no! no! he didn't! -- Ankh deserves nothing -- I deserve Ankh.

 

Eiji's feet hit the water, and he continued walking, until a wave swept along, and he fell to his knees. The eyes were noticeably more green, now.

 


	11. Chapter 11

Ankh gave pause in his attacks at the strange behavior of the King-- of Eiji? He took a couple steps forward, hesitant. "Eiji..." He felt his voice catch in his throat. "I can't do that," he said softly. He was a Greeed, and all he did was want, want, want. The idea of destroying something he desired so... of ending something that made him feel so fulfilled... It made Ankh feel very cold.

 

He dropped his shoulders, letting the tension leave his body. "Eiji," he began again, because he knew he was in there now. "I know that I'm just a pile of medals. But being with you-- it made me feel... like..." Ankh gave a huff, frustrated at his own ineloquence. "...Being with you, I felt like more than that. You... made me feel like I... was alive."

 

He continued to walk forward, towards the armored man, feeling himself tense again the closer he got. His well-honed sense of self-preservation urged him to run, to attack, not to be stupid.

 

But instead, he transformed back into his human form when he was close enough, focusing his grainy, dulled vision on the man. He was much too close for his own safety, no claws or armor with which to defend himself.

 

"All a Greeed does is want. And I never thought that I'd feel satisfied, or ever not want." He paused, a very slight, bitter smile at his lips. "But with you, I feel... fulfilled. ...I never thought that anything would make me feel so happy. I don't know if I ever told you that."

 

Ankh leveled his gaze down to the large eyes of the suit, expression very soft, very sad.

 

"So... Thank you, Eiji."

 

Before Ankh could approach him fully, Eiji had slumped, pulling his legs out from under him, lying back in the water. Every wave just barely brushed over him, not completely covering him. He wouldn't drown yet, but he was so, so tired.

 

As Ankh talked, in that soft, soft voice, Eiji relaxed more. His shoulders dipped down into the wet ground, his feet and legs disappeared under the deeper water, and he looked up at Ankh. Slowly, but surely, the purple disappeared from the eyes, and they showed a dim green.

 

"Ankh..." he said, and the transformation ended. The water soaked through his clothes and the sudden coldness of it chilled him to the bone. He shivered once, and he blinked his eyes slowly, reaching out a hand to the Greeed.

 

Eiji ... had never expected anything to go like this. From the moment that he had been forcibly possessed and forced to put on the OOO Belt... he really hadn't imagined he would fall in love with a monster. ... No, Ankh wasn't a monster. He was Ankh. He wasn't exactly human, but he was... something, something that Eiji loved unconditionally.

 

He never imagined that he'd want to see Ankh smile forever and ever, even when he was gone. Ever since the King first possessed him, first infected him with these medals that were too cold to touch, Eiji knew his time was even more limited than before. That's why he didn't want Ankh to worry about him, and his love, it seemed, was his downfall.

 

The man sat up slowly, pulling his hand down, then stood, even slower. He walked several steps away from Ankh, keeping his back turned. He felt ... at peace, here, with Ankh behind him, one of the only beings who he could feel at peace with, looking at the sun that was getting ready to set.

 

"Ankh," he said, and he realized he had been choking back tears, "you're welcome... and thank you, Ankh, too."

 

Ankh wouldn't do it. Would he? He pulled the three purple cores from the driver. He almost didn't want to touch them, they were so cold -- yet so hot. His vision swam in and out, fuzzy and ugly.

 

"Ankh... I truly do love you," he said, and now the tears freely fell, mingling with the salt water surrounding his knees. "But... he and I... are..." He hiccupped, and he took one medal in one hand, holding it up to the light to see through it. "We can't be separated now, Ankh. I am the King... and the King is me."

 

Still holding onto the two of the medals tightly, he reached up with that hand, and he snapped--a lot easier than he figured it'd be, in the physical sense--clean in half. It disappeared after it was broken, only dust on the wind. Eiji gasped, clutching at his chest, and he seemed to be fighting off an infection, stumbling forward and leaning forward.

 

"I... don't want you hurt, Ankh." Even though Ankh couldn't see him, he smiled. He could smile all day thinking of Ankh, just thinking. He held up another one of the medals, and with trembling, forced fingers, with the King yelling and trying to take over again, he snapped that one too. He did the same with the third one, and withdrawing another one from his chest, that too.

 

He fell to his knees, then, in the water, shaking horribly. He looked ... sick. It was then that he turned to Ankh, looking over his shoulder at him with tearful eyes and a goofy, dimply smile. "Ankh... please..." And he reached out a hand, shifting in his position. "Will you take my hand, Ankh?"

 

He said that he loved him. He said that he loved him, and Ankh knew it was Eiji. He could’ve cried with relief, that the man seemed to have finally broken through. It would be fine, Eiji was still there, he just needed to remove the medals, then it would all be fine. He froze at Eiji’s next words, though.  
  
Ankh took a couple slow steps forward, before dropping to his knees too, grabbing Eiji’s hand tightly with both hands and holding it close to his chest. “Don’t you dare,” he said, trying to hold back the tremor in his voice, growling. “Don’t you dare do this to me.”  
  
Dropping his head to look at Eiji’s hand, not even caring about the water that lapped at his back and soaked him, Ankh squeezed his hand tightly. Why was Eiji acting like he was dying? A delirious part of his mind asked this, trying to convince himself that if the medals were gone, Eiji would be back to normal, it would be over, he wouldn’t leave Ankh. But Eiji had said it himself. Killing the King meant killing Eiji.  
  
It couldn’t be possible, he’d only kept his resolve this long telling himself that there was another way, only thinking about Eiji’s death as a distant, far off concept, abstract and not /truly/ part of any plan.  
  
He tried to ridicule himself for his emotional state. How stupid, to be so upset, how foolish he’d been to allow himself to get this close. Ankh had known better, that human things like affection and love and trust were dangerous, frivolous. But he couldn’t find it in him to regret it. And he couldn’t bring himself to dismiss the feelings.  
  
It was all he could do to just keep holding his hand, keeping hold of it like Eiji would be gone in an instant if he let go.  
  
Ankh felt drops of water hit their clasped hands, and he wasn’t sure where it was coming from for a moment. His eyes burned, and he removed one hand from where it laid over Eiji’s to shakily rub at his eyes. “You can’t die,” he said, holding Eiji’s hand too tightly. “I still need you, I won’t /let/ you--” But his voice caught.  
  
He was lying to himself, and he knew it. But he didn’t know how else to react, the despair that overwhelmed him completely foreign to him. “Don’t die,” Ankh spoke with a low voice, pleading. “I’ll never forgive you if you do,” he threatened weakly. His eyes still stung with unconscious tears, and a suppressed sob wracked his chest.

 

Eiji leaned into him, forehead resting on his shoulder. He felt cold, frozen, not just from the water but -- destroying the medals seemed like it destroyed a part of his soul each time one cracked. He had gotten his idea back when he fought Maki -- when Maki destroyed two of those medals before falling himself, Eiji had felt it within him. The King and him had been intertwined even before then, but he just hadn't realized.

 

He rested his other hand over Ankh's and his own laced pair. He squeezed Ankh's hand with both of them, and he sniffled into Ankh's shoulder. "I... I'm scared, Ankh," he admitted, leaning closer into him, as if he were just really tired. His nails dug into Ankh's skin. "I don't want to die, but..."

 

At that, he pulled out another medal from his chest, letting go of Ankh's hand long enough to break it. He let the pieces fall into the water, where they dissolved upon contact. He clutched at Ankh's forearm, letting out a little whimper of pain.

 

Everything seemed like a dream. Even the sun was starting to set behind him, slow but sure, dying the sky above them with bloody reds and translucent oranges. His vision still swam terribly, and he was having a really hard time focusing. It took him several tries to take Ankh's hand again, and he squeezed it when he did so, as if he were making up for lost time.

 

His head heart, his chest hurt, his legs, arms, toes, bones, muscles all hurt. His heart hurt, especially. Eiji sniffled again and withdrew the second to last medal. He took it in his hands, and not having the strength to hold his arms up, let them fall into the water between them, where the medal felt even cooler, even hotter, in his grip.

 

Eiji snapped it, and he yelled out, twisting in pain. He bit down hard, gritting his teeth, to keep quiet. He didn't want Ankh to worry. He wanted Ankh to think this was as painless as possible. Funny, he thought, that even when /he/ was the one dying, he still thought of Ankh's feelings.

 

His twisting had allowed him to lay down, mostly in the frigid water, head in Ankh's lap and legs to the side. Ankh smelled nice -- he smelled like Ankh, of ice and sweat and something metallic. He smiled weakly, tilting his head so that he could press his face into Ankh's stomach, taking a deep breath. Silent tears streamed down his cheek.

 

He got an idea, then. He reached down into his pocket, very weakly, where he withdrew all the medals he still had, most of them red ones. He slipped them into Ankh one by one, watching his face innocently as he did so, dimply, goofy smile from ear to ear apparent on his face.

 

"Ankh... I at least stopped him from breaking you..." he whispered, voice deathly low. Color had been drained all from his face, and he still looked tireder yet. "Now... you have all nine, don't you...? Oh... but... weren't you originally..." He blinked, and again, and then shut his eyes for good, as if keeping them open was using too much energy.

 

An overwhelming desire to make Ankh happy spread throughout him, warming him from head to toe, lighting him on fire. The purple medal, the last one, inside him reacted near violently, and he just smiled more. He wanted Ankh to feel whole, to feel complete. Being with the King meant seeing those first memories of Ankh, those first times, when he still could fly wherever he wanted, where he was still King of the Birds.

 

The last medal slowly lifted out of his chest, Eiji giving out a low groan at it. He took it in both hands, and the smile returned.

 

"Ankh... I have to go now..." he said, voice cracking, barely audible. "I... This is... my final... gift..."

 

Eiji clasped the medal in both hands, and he yelled out in pain. If the purple medals could destroy desires, it was only reasonable they could create anything with desire, right? He squirmed in Ankh's lap now, moving closer to him, breathing in that scent of the only person he had ever loved with such an intensity as he did. He was reminded of, all at once, everything he loved about Ankh -- from the way he talked, from the way he got flustered in public, from his disastrous eating habits, from his fashion sense and how he snored while he slept. Everything in between. The desire within him lit again.

 

And soon, he stopped squirming, the peculiar light that had erupted from his hands also fading. He didn't uncup his hands. He only held them up to Ankh, then slowly revealed what was inside. Although it had started out as the main core purple medal, it had been transformed into a brilliantly shining Taka medal, miraculously, imbued with the rest of Eiji's life essence.

 

He opened his eyes again, smiling so brightly, as if he weren't dying in Ankh's arms, up at him. "I made you feel... whole, right...? Please... you can be... now... Ankh..." His voice grew quieter and quieter with every word. "Tell Hina-chan... and... the others... that... I'll miss them... And Ankh... thank you, Ankh... Don't blame yourself... You're... more than just a pile of medals... You really are human... I... love... you..."

 

Eiji's eyes shut, and his hands, whether or not Ankh took the medal from him already, fell to his chest. His head rolled to the side, closer to Ankh, as if he were just nuzzling into the Greeed. The water kicked and swayed around him, and soon, his chest stopped rising and falling in a rhythm. His pulse would be gone, too, though...

 

... The Taka medal he had given him -- if Ankh would hold onto it long enough -- would pulsate as if it were alive.

 

“If you’re scared, then don’t do it,” Ankh snapped, as though Eiji had any control over his own mortality. Ankh felt useless, not doing anything, not trying to stop this. Perhaps if he just told Eiji enough, commanded him not to, he wouldn’t die, through sheer willpower. But he didn’t speak, tilting his head to bury his face into the crook of Eiji’s neck, one or two quelled sobs shaking him. Eiji was in pain, and Ankh felt so, so weak, unable to save him or grant him peace. If he had just been more aware, he could’ve stopped this before it even started. If he was stronger, he could give Eiji a quicker, less painful end. If he’d just been more stubborn, if he’d just been quicker, if--

 

He was slipping, so Ankh adjusted his grip, holding one of Eiji’s shoulders. Warmth seeped into him from Eiji’s hands. No, from the things in Eiji’s hands. Looking down, he could see--so dully, so distorted by both his own vision and the tears that swam in his eyes--his cores. “Don’t go,” he said quietly.

 

But regardless of whether or not Ankh approved of it, Eiji was leaving him.

 

“You idiot… What’s the point of being complete if I’m alone?” He was finding it harder to hold back the tears now, and they fell freely. He was giving Ankh that awful, stupid, beautiful smile, one Ankh would never get to see again, he realized. He tried to memorize it, the curve of his lips and how brightly his eyes shone, although he couldn’t get the colors right.

 

He tried to open his mouth, to tell Eiji that he loved him too, he loved him too much to possibly ever describe it fully. He choked on tears instead.

 

“Eiji, please,” Ankh said weakly. “I don’t want to be complete… I want /you/. So please…”

 

He wasn’t breathing anymore. The soft, rhythmic breathing Ankh had grown so used to hearing every night, the heartbeat that kept the most important human that walked this damn earth going, both had sputtered out. Eiji was very still. Too still. “Eiji…” He said, quietly, shaking his shoulder. “Oi, Eiji!” A harder shake. “Eiji! Wake up!” He shook him violently, eyes darting around in panic. “Stop being stupid and wake up!” After a long, strained moment, he stopped, letting his arms fall to his sides.

 

Curling down and wrapping his arms around the man’s prone body, Ankh just clung to him, holding Eiji tightly against him. He shook with sobs freely now, burying his face into Eiji’s shoulder. His mind was so overwhelmed with grief, an entirely new feeling, he couldn’t think. He felt the core in Eiji’s hands, felt it pulsate. His cores called out to it, yearning to be reunited with the missing tenth. The tenth core tugged similarly, trying to get closer to him.

 

But Ankh didn’t want to let go of Eiji to take the medal, instead continuing to hold Eiji tightly. He hadn’t let go of Eiji’s hand, he’d kept hold of him, and Eiji had still left him. Ankh only pulled back a little after a very, very long span of minutes, a trembling hand prying the medal from Eiji’s hands, blanching at how cold he already was.

 

Looking at the medal through tearful eyes, Ankh held it tightly, clinging to the small, warm piece of metal. His mind was too flooded by feeling and confusion, but he dimly refused to absorb it. If he did… would he forget Eiji? If he returned to being King of the Birds, which he had dreamed of being again for so long, would the King of the Birds remember anything of Ankh? Of humans? Of this human, that Ankh felt he could never forget?

 

He couldn’t think, so with shaking hands, he tucked away the medal, feeling his cores pull at it insistently.

 

Eiji was so cold… If he took him out of the water, maybe he’d warm, Ankh thought dazedly. Stumbling, his limbs not seeming to want to cooperate, Ankh pulled Eiji’s body from the water, setting him on the beach. Pulling him close, he held the man once again. He buried his face into Eiji’s chest, feeling violent sobs overtake him.

 

Ankh wanted to call him an idiot again, demand that he wake up, beg him to open his damn eyes and look at Ankh. But he knew it wouldn’t happen. Not even thinking of moving, of doing anything, he held Eiji, and wished desperately that Eiji would hold him in return.

 

“Eiji… please…”

 

He would've lied there for a very long time.

 

It took, surprisingly, awhile for a candroid to find Ankh and Eiji. Satonaka had agreed to working overtime, just this once, when the candroid hinted that at least one of them wasn't moving. They kept it hidden from Hina. She couldn't know just yet, especially when they didn't know which one was silent forever, now.

 

The car pulled up silently, the headlights putting Ankh and Eiji into the spotlight. Before it had even stopped, Date had jumped out, nearly tripping over something in the sand, and hurried off, while Gotou called out to him to just wait.

 

In the light, it was inexplicably clear which one wasn't coming back.

 

"Hino!" the doctor yelled. He came to a halting stop a foot or so away from Ankh and the... Eiji (he didn't want to think of him as a corpse just yet). "Hino..." Every muscle in his body froze, and his brows drew in, furrowing in both confusion and grief.

 

Gotou approached next, glancing down at the sorry sight. Although he wanted to--with the way Ankh was holding him, clinging onto him, refusing to even let him go even after all these hours, to the point where his warmth had staved off Eiji's lips from turning all the way blue--he couldn't blame Ankh for this. He realized he just wanted /someone/ to blame, and Ankh couldn't be that scapegoat.

 

Satonaka came last, taking a little longer than the others. She didn't say anything. She just stood in between Date and Gotou with her arms crossed. She shifted occasionally, as if she were uncomfortable being here.

 

It was her, surprisingly, that had moved first, breaking the silence and returning time to its rightful pace. She sniffled, wiping her tears on her sleeve, not even thinking about how the makeup would ruin the outfit. She knelt down, placing a gentle hand on Ankh's shoulder.

 

"Ankh..." she said, sniffling again. "We should... get him home."

 

Ankh flinched at the hand on his shoulder, although his entire body trembled already. He took a deep, shaky breath, lifting his head so only his forehead touched Eiji’s chest. He still wasn’t thinking of it as Eiji’s body either. He couldn’t wrap his mind around considering the prone form a body, not Eiji himself. He looked up, gaze fierce and panicked, like a cornered animal, trembling so hard. He looked as though he might lash out at Satonaka, or either of the two men, but after a strained moment, he just fell limp, face pressed against Eiji’s chest once again, shoulders drawn in.  
  
He could feel hands trying to gently pry Eiji from his grasp, and Ankh just held on tighter, curling protectively over the limp body. “Ankh, please,” Satonaka said softly. “We just need to get… to get him back home. Just bring him to the car.” Ankh still didn’t move, drawing in shaky breaths. There was mumbled talk among the three, that Ankh didn’t quite hear, and didn’t care about hearing.  
  
“Anko-- Ankh, come on, we’ll take him, if you don’t want to.” More silence, and Ankh felt hands once again, this time on his arms, trying to pull him away. He clung as tightly as he could, shaking his head.   
  
There were two people grabbing him now, trying to separate the two, and Ankh twisted in their grip, snapping a violent “No!”  
  
But his grip had grown too weak, and he was so, so tired. Ankh struggled, threatened, yelled, but he was pulled away, kicking violently. A few moments after being separated from Eiji, Ankh grew limp suddenly, falling silent after the burst of protest. He was so tired. Too weary to lash out or attack or yell anymore, even when he was released, and pulled gently to his feet, guided to the car. He was put into a seat next to Eiji, and looking down blearily, he focused on his still hand. It was cold, he thought, so he tried to warm it, taking Eiji’s hand gently and lacing their fingers together. He didn’t realize he was losing consciousness until his vision went dark.

 


	12. Chapter 12

There had been a near constant flurry of activity when they’d gotten back to the restaurant, then oppressive stillness. Ankh hadn’t really paid attention to any of it. When he’d gotten the chance, he’d gone to the back room, very quietly, shutting the door slowly behind him. He didn’t want to be with the body anymore. His eyes first fell on the nest on Eiji’s bed, and he felt his throat close up, tears threatening to make an appearance again. But they didn’t. Ankh walked over to the bed, sat down. He picked up a scarf, holding it between trembling fingers before he wrapped it around his own neck.  
  
It didn’t help as much as he thought it might. Feeling it still tugging at his cores, Ankh reached into his pocket and drew out the medal. He held it up to the light, looking at it uncertainly. Perhaps it would be best to forget. The grief that made his cores ache so badly, yearning for something that was forever out of reach now… It hurt, made Ankh want to curl up and disappear, so he’d never have to feel it again.  
  
But at the same time, forgetting Eiji… he felt like this would be even more painful, even if he didn’t realize it or remember why. He promised himself, he wouldn’t forget. He’d be stubborn, so stubborn as he always was, and he wouldn’t let go of Eiji. Ankh couldn’t do it if he didn’t promise himself that. He dropped his hand, before lifting the medal up again, to press his lips to it gently. Despite it being his own medal, it was the last piece of Eiji he had left. “I love you,” he whispered to the medal. It was so warm. If he focused hard enough, he could almost imagine that he could feel life thrumming under his fingers.  
  
“Let’s go, Eiji,” he murmured. They could go somewhere far away, somewhere where nothing could hurt either of them. Somewhere beautiful, where they could be together forever.  
  
He pressed the medal to his chest, feeling his body grow warmer and warmer, like he was burning, but it didn’t hurt. Everything was so bright, and hot, Ankh trembled. It still wasn’t painful, just overwhelming, and he fell back on the bed, gasping and clutching his chest like his medals would explode at any moment. Ankh shut his eyes, drawing in deep breaths.  
  
When Ankh’s eyes closed, the heat became blinding, overwhelming. He couldn’t think, couldn’t feel anything but the bright, bright warmth blossoming from his chest.  
  
And then Ankh dreamed.  
  
The King of the Birds dreamed of flight, of the wind in his wings, of the beautiful, shining world beneath him. He spread his wings, and he flew high, so high, higher than any other bird could. He felt alive. He felt the warmth of the sun beating down on him, the wind racing through his feathers, and he felt a presence. It was familiar and comforting, the being at his side. It felt right, he decided, for this presence to be by his side. It made him happy... So, so happy.   
  
The King of the Birds didn’t know why, but the small, brown (with a ridiculous, garish pattern around its neck that always made him scoff) bird near constantly at his side always made him recall a word, one he didn’t know the meaning of. He just knew that it felt important. Like something he could never forget. When he flew alongside the small, familiar bird, he felt at peace, like he could never feel more fulfilled, and he could only think…  
  
Eiji.


End file.
